T- 




DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 



A MEMOIR 

OF 



Daniel Wadsworth Coit 



OF 



NORWICH, CONNECTICUT 
1787-1876 



PRIVATELY PRINTED 
November 1908 



CT^-7^ 



THE UNIVERSITY PRESS, CAMBRIDGE, U.S.A. 






THE STORY OF 

" SOME OF THE INCIDENTS OF THE 

EVENTFUL LIFE " OF 

DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

RETOLD 
WITH AFFECTIONATE REMEMBRANCE 

FOR HIS 

DESCENDANTS AND NEAR KINDRED 

AND ALL WHO CHERISH HIS MEMORY 

BY ONE OF HIS NEPHEWS 

IS NOW LOVINGLY INSCRIBED 

TO 

DANIEL COIT GILMAN 

WHO DIED WHILE IT WAS IN PRESS 

AT LOWTHORPE, NORWICH, CONN. 

OCTOBER 13, I908 

BY HIS BROTHER 

W. C. G. 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

A MAN'S own story of his life is, 
or ought to be, the most in- 
teresting of biographies. He, 
himself, a great part of the events he 
describes, telling what he has seen and 
heard and done, holds the center of the 
stage and animates the scene. 

To see him tell the story, sitting by 
his own fireside or under the elms in 
the summer twilight, to listen, and to 
lead him on by questions from one ad- 
venture to another, is more charming 
than written words ; for with pen in 
hand he sometimes assumes that his 
readers are as familiar as he is with 
the causes, the events, and the environ- 
ment that governed or seemed to gov- 
ern him in critical periods of his life, 

[i] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

and thus he leaves them in the dark 
as to facts of vital interest. Or again, 
in a retrospective mood, he may dwell 
on trivial and unimportant matters, 
" droll legends of his infancy," and the 
like, more interesting to himself than 
to any one else, that might be called 
"Twice told tales of a Grandfather." 

The hero of this memoir, Daniel 
Wadsworth Coit, was named for 
his father's friend and companion in 
Europe, Col. Daniel Wadsworth, of 
Hartford. He was born in his father's 
house, "up-town," under the elms, in 
Norwich, Connecticut, on November 
the twenty-ninth, 1787, and in that 
house he died, on the eighteenth of 
July, 1876. 

It is noteworthy that, notwithstand- 
ing the chances and changes of a life 
of very remarkable adventure, this house 
was his home for most of his years, and 
still more noteworthy, in these days of 

[2] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

migration and inevitable family changes, 
that not only he himself, but his father 
and his grandfather and his younger 
son, Daniel Lathrop Coit the second, 
a youth of great promise, — four gen- 
erations, — ended their days under the 
same roof. 

In the year 1877, twelve months after 
his death, a brief sketch of his life, writ- 
ten by his brother, Joshua Coit, of New 
Haven, was printed for his family. This 
was reprinted ten years later, together 
with a filial tribute by his son, Charles 
Woolsey Coit, of Grand Rapids, as sup- 
plementary to his Autobiography, in 
which he had said that "at the re- 
peated solicitation of his family and 
friends and for the gratification of his 
children he had jotted down some of 
the incidents of his eventful life." This 
was a well-chosen expression, for while 
of course no man can continue the story 
of -his life from year to year to the very 

[3] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

end, his modesty and delicate sense of 
propriety prevented more than a slight 
reference to some of the most interest- 
ing "incidents of his eventful life," or 
entirely suppressed them. 

A writer in the "Atlantic Monthly" 
quotes a witty remark that " besides bi- 
ographies and autobiographies there are 
ought-not-to-be-ographies." The auto- 
biography of Daniel Wadsworth Coit is 
not open to the latter designation, for it 
occasions no regret but by its brevity. 
Our knowledge of him has been in- 
creased, however, by letters to his fam- 
ily now in the possession of Mrs. Charles 
W. Coit, and of his granddaughter, Mrs. 
Edward Wilder Haines, and still more 
from letters, greater in number and of 
equal interest, from his parents, and 
brothers and sisters, preserved in the 
archives of Lowthorpe. 

His father, Daniel Lathrop Coit, who 
was descended from John Coit, of Salem, 

[4] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

Massachusetts (about 1630), and from 
the Reverend John Lathrop, a victim 
of persecution in England, and an emi- 
grant to Massachusetts in 1635, died in 
the year 1833 at the age of seventy-nine 
years. 

His mother, Elizabeth, daughter of 
Captain Ephraim Bill, was descended 
from John Bill, of Boston (1635), and 
from Simon Huntington, of Saybrook 
and of Norwich (1659). She died at 
the age of seventy-nine in the year 
1846. 

Among his ancestors are also John 
Gager and Thomas Adgate, who are 
enrolled among the founders of Nor- 
wich (1659), and John Perkins and 
Joshua Abel. Such ancestry, good 
English stock, transplanted to new soil, 
is a heritage for which later genera- 
tions may congratulate themselves. 

He was the oldest of six children, 
three sons and three daughters, and, 

[5] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

unlike some families who seem to boast 
that they "enjoy poor health/' serious 
illness was almost unknown among 
them, and the average of their ages at 
death exceeded four score years. It 
was a happy family, and the bond of 
affection established in childhood was 
firm to the end of their days. The 
house on the hillside, under the elms, 
where they were born, built by their 
father, and kept in repair and improved 
from time to time, remains, after nearly 
a century and a quarter, in the posses- 
sion of two of his granddaughters, and 
is practically unchanged in appearance 
both without and within. 

In June it was as delightful then as 
it is in these degenerate days, when one 
shudders to think of their winters and 
winter nights, and, worse still, of the 
everlasting spring; not the "everlasting 
spring" of the hymnal, but the real, 
old fashioned, uncommonly late spring, 
[6] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

with impassable roads, no public con- 
veyances, private vehicles quite out of 
commission, the meadows bleak and 
desolate, and the wheels of industry- 
stopped by the ice-bound water courses. 
The house was, indeed, abundantly 
stored with provisions and raiment and 
fuel, but there were no steam heaters, 
no furnace, no kitchen range sending 
perpetual streams of hot water to every 
floor, — nothing but open wood fires 
which must be carefully banked up at 
bedtime to prevent the escape of a 
single spark, and to keep a few coals 
alive for the morning. Happily, when 
the call was heard, " heap on the wood, 
the wind is chill," there was plenty of 
"old wood to burn." 

There was no evening lamp to be 
lighted; the "astral" had not yet come 
into use; and constant nightly experi- 
ment determined how far a little candle 
could shed its beams. Providence had 

[7] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

not raised up Mr. Rockefeller as a light- 
bearer to the whole world to crush his 
rivals, the poor whales, and drive them 
out of a profitable business with his 
standard oil. The night air was cold 
enough for the requirements of modern 
advocates of the refrigerative treatment of 
tuberculosis, and yet, although this family 
escaped it, the dreaded white plague was 
not unknown in the town. But though 
they knew them not there were allevia- 
tions, for they were spared self-register- 
ing thermometers, telling how cold had 
been the night, and weather bureau 
forecasts of a colder to-morrow ! 

His boyhood was spent in Norwich, 
where, and at the adjacent town of Lis- 
bon, he attended the best schools ; but 
though he was a fair scholar there can 
be no doubt that his best education was 
received in the home circle under the 
guidance of his father, whose cultured 
mind had been improved by foreign 
[8] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

travel, and under the sweet influence of 
his devoted mother. 

His nearest neighbors were his own 
cousins, the Lathrops, seven bright boys 
and girls whose ages differed not widely 
from those of his own family. Their 
mother, Mrs. Hannah Bill Lathrop, 
and two of the daughters known to 
the present generation as Mrs. Emily 
Perkins and Mrs. Hannah Ripley are 
still held in affectionate remembrance. 
There were other Lathrop cousins, Coit 
and Huntington cousins, and Perits, and 
a host of cousins-once-removed, many 
of whom were his schoolmates and near 
friends. To be remembered with them 
also is Lydia Huntley, afterwards Mrs. 
Sigourney. 

The wise man of Portland in the east 
told his attractive daughters that he 
knew some one in Norwich who had 
a pair of rose-colored spectacles which 
would bring a distant relation as near 

[9] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

as a second cousin ! Those glasses came 
down from a former generation which 
had proved their usefulness in a wide 
family circle. 

His natural preference was for active 
life out of doors ; he knew the hiding- 
place of the big trout in the brook, and 
many a quail and partridge and wood- 
cock fell before his unerring fowling- 
piece. From his father he inherited a 
love for practical work in the garden 
and orchard, and these pursuits, not less 
than the cold winters, strengthening his 
constitution, were an admirable prepa- 
ration for the toilsome and perilous 
journeys of later years. 

When he was about fourteen years 
old, in 1 80 1, in the absence of his father 
on a long journey to Ohio, he was quite 
the man of the house ; and keeping a 
watchful eye on affairs generally, and 
especially on the garden, he made fre- 
quent reports to his father. In July 

[10] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

he says : " The garden looks as well as it 
did last year ; " and again he speaks 
of " inoculating the peach trees." His 
father replies : " Daniel's account of 
outdoor transactions affords me much 
pleasure, not only that the things men- 
tioned have been done, but that he is 
thoughtful to mention them." 

Without quoting largely from other 
letters, extracts from a letter from his 
mother to her husband, and from a 
letter from the father to the son, will 
sufficiently illustrate the family relation 
at that time. 

Elizabeth Coit to her husband, July 
21, 1801 : 

" I hope, my dear, you will find the chil- 
dren have made some improvement, but do 
not expect too much or you will be disap- 
pointed. I feel sometimes almost impatient 
with the slow progress they make when I 
reflect how many things they have to learn 
and how fast time flies, and I very sensibly 

[»] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

feel my incapacity to fill up their time to 
the best advantage. I cannot sufficiently 
impress on their minds the importance of 
study and learning while they are young. 
Some relaxation I know they require, but I 
am frequently at a loss how far to indulge 
them. Daniel's propensity for amusement 
is very great, but his judgment is not suffi- 
cient to direct his choice. Books which 
afford the most rational amusement he does 
not relish alone, and I have little time to 
hear him free from interruption. He is as 
attentive to my business as I could expect, 
and is very obedient, as are all the children." 

Daniel Lathrop Coit to his son 
Daniel, aged fourteen : 

YOUNGSTOWN (O.), 19 AugUSt, l8oi. 

My dear Boy, — I don't know but you 
will expect a letter directly to you during my 
long absence, and I shall be well satisfied in 
writing to you if it will afford you either 
pleasure or advantage. . . . 

I take great satisfaction in learning from 
your mama, and, indeed, from your own 

[12] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

letter and by Col. Huntington, that you 
are so attentive to the concerns of the family 
in my absence. I am likewise gratified that 
Bristol * is so careful and attentive in matters 
of a domestic nature ; indeed, I ought to 
have commissioned you to thank him that 
he was desirous of my remembrance, &c, 
thereby manifesting his regard for me. I 
therefore do it now. 

We ought at no time to receive any favor 
or civility of even so small a kind without 
some suitable acknowledgment, and surely 
thanks are a cheap and easy return. Of this, 
my dear, I wish you to be truly sensible, 
and that every species of ingratitude is a 
great blot in the character of any person pos- 
sessed of reason and understanding. . . . 
Always be ready to acknowledge a favor, 
and to repay it as a debt of honor and jus- 
tice. At the same time do not always wait 
to be indebted in this way, but be as ready 
to grant as to receive a favor, remembering 

1 This Bristol, an old negro slave, an inheritance from 
Daniel Lathrop Coit's aunt, Madam Green, was a tole- 
rated tyrant in the household. He it was who refused to 
recognize Sunday as the Sabbath when by chance there 
were no baked beans for breakfast ! 

[13] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

that if we even sometimes make some sacri- 
fices in this way we are sure to be repaid in 
kind, or, what is of more consequence, have 
an approving conscience, which is at all times 
one of the greatest sources of happiness a 
man can enjoy. 

I think I can truly say that I have no 
more fervent and anxious desire of an earthly 
nature than to procure for your mama and 
my children as great a share of happiness 
and contentment as they are capable of, and 
you will readily agree that my experience is 
greater than yours, and that the advice I 
give you in order to promote your happi- 
ness must be more safely trusted to than 
your own opinion where it shall differ from 
mine. . . . The present is the time for the 
cultivation of your understanding and form- 
ing useful and good habits, and you may 
believe me when I assure you that when 
once good habits are formed they will be as 
easily practiced as bad ones and will afford 
infinitely more satisfaction. Study, then, my 
son, to improve your mind and to render 
yourself by kind, affable, and agreeable man- 
ners, pleasing and acceptable to all whom 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

you have reason to respect and esteem. . . . 
I wish you to be convinced that if you set 
out thus early in life with an inflexible reso- 
lution, and continue to pursue it with steadi- 
ness, you may make yourself almost whatever 
you wish. It is little I can do for you ; I 
can just point out the road, but it must 
be your own exertion that shall carry you 
through it. I feel a great desire that you 
shall become agreeable and estimable to all 
your acquaintance, and this, I know, you 
can easily do, and that to effect this will 
be the most ready way to promote your 
happiness. 

Your studies, I hope, you will regard as 
of great importance, for on them will depend 
in a great measure your future prospects in 
life. Learning is the inlet of knowledge, 
and by knowledge men are raised above the 
rest of creation, and a few among men above 
the rest in Honor, Respect, and Esteem. . . . 

Adieu, my son ; be attentive and obedient 
to your mama, and endeavor to make up her 
loss of me as much as is in your power. 

Your loving and affectionate Father, 

Daniel L. Coit. 

[15] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

These benign influences were not lost 
upon the " Dear Boy." He heard the 
instructions of his father, and forgot not 
the law of his mother, and when he 
was old he did not depart from them. 

When he was about fifteen years old 
he and his sister Lydia and his brother 
Henry were sent to Mr. Hale's school 
at Lisbon ; his parents, with the younger 
children, Maria, Eliza, and little Joshua, 
having removed to New York in con- 
sequence of his father's business engage- 
ments. Twelve months later he joined 
them, and after a few months with Gil- 
bert and John Aspinwall, merchants and 
importers of dry goods, was formally 
indentured to them for a term of nearly 
five years, until he should attain his 
majority. 

The indenture, signed and sealed by 
all the parties to it, bound his employ- 
ers to teach him " the trade, art, and 
[16] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

mystery of a merchant," — he on his 
part, and his father for him, agreeing 
that " he shall of his own free will and 
accord his master faithfully serve, his 
secrets keep, and his lawful commands 
everywhere readily obey ; shall not con- 
tract matrimony ; shall refrain from 
vice, and from business on his own 
account ; and in all things shall behave 
himself as a faithful apprentice ought 
to do during his term of service/' His 
only compensation was to be his board 
and washing. The theory was that the 
employer stood in the place of a parent 
to the apprentice, was interested in his 
welfare, gave him special opportunities 
for advancement and improvement, with 
a commercial education that was a full 
equivalent for his services. By this 
system, now almost obsolete, except as 
it may be suggested by the youthful 
experience of Admiral Sir Joseph Porter 
in " Pinafore," he received a training 
[17] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

that was invaluable in the important 
and complicated transactions in which 
he was concerned in later years. The 
art of writing a faultless business letter, 
acquired early in life, was an accom- 
plishment not to be despised, in which 
he excelled. 

The particular duties of the youngest 
clerk, as he describes them, were " to 
open the store at an early hour, to sweep 
and dust the floors, to make fires through- 
out the winter, and not infrequently 
to roll empty hogsheads and barrels 
through the streets for packing, and to 
shoulder and carry goods from one part 
of the city to another. ,, If the hours 
were no more than sixty minutes long 
there were more working hours in 
twenty-four than there are now, and 
that work was often carried well into 
the night appears by letters to his par- 
ents, written when he was " so sleepy 
he could hardly keep his eyes open." 
[18] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

He was desirous of acquiring a knowl- 
edge of the French language, and there- 
fore changed his boarding-place to a 
family w r here it was spoken, but carried 
with him the kind interest of his land- 
lady, who offered to continue to mend 
his clothes, " But," he says, " of course 
I shall not think of letting her." 

Replying to his father's suggestion 
that he should avoid bad company, he 
says: 

"I should be sorry to have you under 
apprehension of my getting acquainted with 
bad characters here, as my acquaintance is 
very limited, and I have been more confined 
at home this winter than usual, as my French 
has required my attendance evenings, and I 
have no other time to myself. I have, how- 
ever, to thank you for your good advice on 
this subject, and shall always be very thankful 
to you for it." 

Before proceeding with him in the 
next steps of his career it is interesting 

[ 19 ] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

to close this chapter with an extract 
from a letter of his brother Joshua to 
his nieces, from which other quotations 
will be made hereafter. 

" He had a physical organization admi- 
rably adapted to what he took in hand. His 
eye was quick, keen, and true as an Indian 
hunter's ; his hand pliant, dexterous, and 
ready in all the manipulations for which he 
had occasion ; his frame, light, sinewy, ac- 
tive, and, at least in early life, capable of 
long-continued exertion. His early love 
for field sports, in which he never entirely 
lost his interest, gave scope and exercise 
to all these qualities to which they greatly 
contributed. 

" His beautiful handwriting, his familiar 
letters, written with facility and despatch, in 
businesslike form, without flourish and with- 
out blot or erasure, were, particularly if ac- 
companied by a plan or sketch, like the 
careful work of a civil engineer. He was 
so much my senior that I was too young to 
take any part in his field sports before he 
had left home for a counting-house in New 
[ao'j 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

York, but I fell heir to sundry ingeniously 
constructed boy's sleds, box traps, fences, 
and snares for game, set up in the woods, 
and other like devices by which, I am sorry 
to say, I profited less than I might have 
done." 

If in the latter years of his appren- 
ticeship, realizing that his knowledge 
and experience had become valuable, he 
impatiently looked for the day when he 
should earn something more than bread 
and butter and cease to be a burden on 
his father, he nevertheless fulfilled his 
contract to the end. He then engaged 
for a year as assistant with his friend 
and cousin, David Greene Hubbard, at 
a salary of $500, with the privilege of 
trading for himself: not an enormous 
income, indeed, but infinite riches com- 
pared with nothing. After another 
twelvemonth he began business solely 
on his own account, employing as a 
clerk his brother Henry, of whom he 

[21] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

wrote in praise as " doing as well as he 
could expect, and as likely to become 
of much service after a little more prac- 
tice/' He and his father also entered 
into partnership with their kinsman, 
William Leffingwell, of New Haven, 
but owing to the hard times it was of 
short duration. 

But the most interesting of his many- 
enterprises was obtaining and manufac- 
turing quercitron bark, then as now 
used by tanners and dyers. With this 
object he traversed the forests of New 
Jersey where he resided for a time, and 
established a mill for grinding and pre- 
paring the bark for export. His cous- 
ins, G. G. and S. S. Howland, also took 
an interest with him, and his father en- 
gaged in the manufacture at Norwich. 
It is characteristic of father and son that 
they were scrupulously careful that their 
product should be of the best possible 
quality for shipment, and that, sparing 

[22] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

neither labor nor expense, they gave 
their own close personal attention to 
details. They were sensible that it cost 
as much to transport a poor article as a 
good one, and that a good reputation 
went far to command a good price. His 
father wrote to him, "That you have 
made any profit, or are like to, gives me 
real pleasure; but be cautious, — not 
too sanguine : keep within your own 
depth." 

A recent writer in the "Forestry 
Magazine" (November, 1907), says: 
"A famine in tan-bark oak is seriously 
threatening the Pacific coast tanning 
industry. Continual harvesting is rap- 
idly depleting the supply, and disastrous 
fires the last fifteen years have destroyed 
bark that would be worth one and one- 
third million dollars." 

The monotonous routine of work, 
however, was not without relief. He 
was always a welcome guest in the large 

[23] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

family circle of his Howland cousins, 
sons and daughters, in New York and 
Phillipsburgh ; there were occasional 
opportunities for a day's sport with dog 
and gun in New Jersey or on Long 
Island; and the considerable skill in 
sketching and drawing in water-colors 
which he acquired at this time afforded 
him great pleasure as long as he lived. 
Perhaps it is significant, too, that a 
young man of fine appearance and at- 
tractive manners was somewhat partic- 
ular about the ruffles of his shirts ! 

Although he himself does not speak 
of military honors, we know that in the 
year 1814, when the Atlantic coast was 
ravaged by the British fleet, and New 
York was in such peril that almost every 
able-bodied man was pressed into ser- 
vice, he was not found wanting, but 
served with the Huzzars in defence of 
the city. 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

The first eighteen years of the nine- 
teenth century were not altogether pro- 
pitious for mercantile business. In this 
country feuds of federalists and repub- 
licans, in congress and in the newspapers, 
raging with unrestrained bitterness and 
malignity, resulted not infrequently in 
personal violence and the deadly duel. 
Hard words were freely used, com- 
pared with which the forcible explosions 
of ebullient wrath in high places that 
sometimes shock us to-day are like the 
gentle roaring of a sucking dove. The 
vituperation and scurrility of the news- 
papers of the period would be intolerable 
even in modern yellow journals. Can 
any one imagine the present editor 
of the "Evening Post" as adopting 
for his own the following words di- 
rected by his illustrious predecessor, 
William Cullen Bryant, to Thomas 
Jefferson, and addressing them to Theo- 
dore Roosevelt? 

[25] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

" Go, wretch ! resign the Presidential chair, 
Disclose thy secret measures, foul or fair; 
Go, search with curious eyes for horned frogs, 
'Mid the wild wastes of Louisiana bogs." 

Our southern border and great western 
frontier were harassed by hostile Indian 
tribes; communication and transporta- 
tion by land or water were difficult and 
expensive; strikes and labor riots were 
not infrequent ; the slavery question was 
vexatious ; and arguments for and against 
"protection of our infant industries" 
kept merchants in perpetual perplexity. 
It was a serious question whether the 
tariff on imported calfskins should not 
be raised so as to sustain the price of 
our quercitron bark ! 

More than this, the English Orders 
in Council, the Berlin and Milan de- 
crees, the impressment of American sea- 
men by the British claiming the right 
of search, the blockade of our ports, the 
embargo, the capture of hundreds of 

[26] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

our merchantmen by the French, were 
among the exasperating causes that cul- 
minated in the war of 1 8 1 2 and para- 
lyzed our commerce. 

A young merchant, unwilling to risk 
everything by running the blockade in 
violation of law with the hope of mak- 
ing a fortune, could do but little more 
than make occasional purchases of com- 
modities, that could be bought cheap in 
New York, and ship them to Connecti- 
cut, receiving in return coarse country 
produce and manufactured stuff that 
might be salable in the city. Some ad- 
venturous spirits, taking chances, found 
it expedient at short notice to seek se- 
clusion in foreign parts. It is no won- 
der, then, that " at the end of ten years 
in commission and shipping business, it 
had resulted in little benefit beyond the 
experience acquired." But how valu- 
able was that experience ! It was in- 
vested capital. 

[27] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

It is remarkable that during this long 
period, when financial and commercial 
affairs were at the lowest ebb, when taxes 
were enormously high, and great unrest 
prevailed throughout the country, this 
constant, intimate family correspond- 
ence was almost exclusively confined 
to domestic affairs, with scarcely an 
allusion to public events, not even to 
the achievements of our navy on the 
ocean and great lakes, nor the famous 
victory of General Jackson at New Or- 
leans, nor, nearer home, to the burning 
of Stonington in 1 8 14 by the British. 

But in spite of everything the country 
grew and prospered. Extensive internal 
improvements were projected and car- 
ried on by the government ; lighthouses 
were erected; steam navigation began 
on the Hudson River ; the Coast Survey, 
of inestimable value, was founded ; and 
the acquisition of Florida and Louisiana, 
by means however questionable at the 

[28] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

time, added enormously in the end to 
the prosperity of the country. With the 
administration of President Monroe be- 
gan what was popularly called " the era 
of good feeling/' and at about the same 
time there came a turn in the tide of 
the affairs of our hero which led him 
on to fortune. 

In the year 1 8 1 8 his cousins, G. G. 
and S. S. Howland, already mentioned, 
well-known merchants in New York, 
invited him to enter their counting- 
room on a salary larger than he had 
ever received, and gave him encourage- 
ment that they might in the near future 
offer him a better position. Within a 
few months, in partnership with Peter 
Harmony, a Spanish merchant resident 
in New York, they determined to send 
to Peru a cargo of firearms, munitions 
of war, and other merchandise, and, 
through the favor of the Spanish minis- 

[29] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

ter, obtained a license for the admission 
of the cargo into that country, which 
was then at war with the adjoining 
province of Chile. Accordingly they 
fitted out the small, fast-sailing brig 
" Boxer," and gave Mr. Coit the situa- 
tion of supercargo. The supercargo 
was a person of no small importance, 
for, although the captain was charged 
with the navigation of the vessel and 
discipline of the crew, upon the super- 
cargo, as the confidential agent and 
personal representative of the owners, 
devolved the responsibility of disposing 
of the cargo and of collecting and re- 
mitting the proceeds, under instructions 
of course, yet with large discretionary 
power in emergencies. 

The vessel was loaded with despatch 
and with secrecy lest the purpose of the 
voyage and the nature of the cargo 
should become known ; the crew was 
shipped, and his own preparations were 

[30] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

made ; but much to his regret he had 
no opportunity of visiting his home in 
Norwich, where his father was suffering 
from an accidental fall. 

And now began the Voyage of Life ! 

" Journal on board the Brig Boxer, Wil- 
liam Skiddy, master, from New York towards 
Northwest Coast of South America. 

"Sunday, Sept. 27, 181 8. Got under way 
at 9 o'clock, A. M., with a light breeze from 
N. West: were becalmed in the bay at 
3 P. M. : at 8 P. M., a breeze springing up, 
passed by the Hook, and at 9 P. M. dis- 
charged the Pilot and proceeded to sea. 

"All hands on board in good health." 

These are the first words of the super- 
cargo's private log-book, in which he 
kept a daily record of latitude and longi- 
tude, of the temperature of the air and 
water, of distance traveled "per log," 
with brief notes of the weather, the 
vessel's course, and other incidents of 
the long voyage of one hundred and 

[31] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

six days, covering by his calculation 
13,405 miles. 

Needless to say, there were no stops 
for coal, nor was this a junketing cruise, 
like that of President Roosevelt's "Ar- 
mada" in its majestic course to the Pacific. 
Not a single port was entered, and direct 
communication was had with but one 
vessel, a homeward-bound Nantucket 
whaler, whose captain came on board 
and became the bearer of a letter to 
New York. The highest temperature 
recorded is eighty-eight degrees, and the 
lowest thirty-nine degrees. The longest 
day's run was two hundred and forty- 
three miles, and the shortest eighteen 
miles. The vessel crossed the equator 
on November 1, but we have no record 
of the "high jinks" which traditionally 
celebrate that event. At midnight a 
week later, however, sufficient excite- 
ment of a different kind was created by 
the imminent danger of shipwreck on 

[32] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

one of the small precipitous islands of 
Martin Vass, to the eastward of Brazil. 
This peril was happily averted, and the 
voyage, he says, "was not unpleasant, with 
the exception of about thirty days com- 
ing round Cape Horn, where we experi- 
enced much bad weather, and were three 
weeks of the time under storm sails. " 
" I am not anxious," he adds, " to make 
the voyage again in winter, in a vessel 
not one of the strongest." The only 
diversion for the voyager in the gloom 
of the perpetual fogs of the region was 
in watching the whales and porpoises, 
the penguins, and other aquatic birds 
that abounded in the air and sea. 

At this time, also, occurred the most 
exciting incident of the voyage, — a 
mutinous demonstration by the mate 
and half the crew, who, defying the 
captain, refused to obey orders. Their 
purpose was to take possession of the 
vessel, run her into a port of Chile, and 
3 [33] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

sell the arms to the government ; but it 
was frustrated by the coolness and cour- 
age of the captain, who subdued them 
with his pistols, though the situation 
was for a time alarming. 

The arrival of his vessel off the harbor 
of Callao, eight miles distant from the 
city of Lima, on the 14th of January, 
1 819, ended his voyage, but by no 
means ended his adventures, for, being 
becalmed late in the day, it became 
necessary for him to take a boat with 
two seamen and row in to the shore in 
the hope of finding a pilot ; " But," he 
says, — 

" the shore being more distant than we sup- 
posed we were benighted before arriving 
there : and in consequence, not being able 
to land on the rocky shore with the surf 
rolling heavily, I steered for what I supposed 
to be the port, and about eleven o'clock at 
night fell in with the guard boat on duty 
patrolling the harbor. My explanations, 
being anything but satisfactory I was arrested 

[34] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

as a prisoner of war and put on board the 
Spanish Ship of war c Esmeralda/ " 

There were two parties in Peru at this 
time, the royalists, who supported the 
Spanish viceroy, and the revolutionists, 
who advocated a popular government. 
Moreover, the government of Chile had 
designs upon Peru, and with the co- 
operation of Lord Cochrane, who had 
distinguished himself in the English 
navy, was known to be preparing to 
send a fleet from Valparaiso against 
Lima ; it was, indeed, hourly expected. 

"It was natural, therefore, that suspicion 
should attach to a boat discovered at mid- 
night prowling about the harbor, and that 
I should be arrested as a spy. Our arrival 
on the frigate occasioned no little stir. The 
captain with his leading officers formed a 
council and subjected us to a long course 
of examination, the result of which was 
that I was sent on shore in charge of an 
officer to the Admiral. With some diffi- 

[35] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

culty he was aroused from his slumbers, 
and was so alarmed that he came in person 
with us on board the ship and again sifted 
the sailors and myself with questions. It 
was finally determined to await the arrival 
of the Boxer, and I was shown to the 
ward room and provided with comfortable 
quarters until the following afternoon when 
the brig, which had been concealed by the 
island of San Lorenzo, hove in sight, and 
in a few hours freed me from my anxiety 
and temporary confinement." 

It now became a very serious question 
what to do with his cargo. Business 
naturally came to a standstill ; and as 
opportunities to sell were for a time cut 
off, it seemed equally unsafe to discharge 
it or to leave it on board. Under the cir- 
cumstances the best course seemed to be 
to bring the brig within the Spanish 
lines for protection and land his cargo 
as soon as possible. Hardly had he 
done so when in came Admiral Coch- 
rane with a fleet of five large ships, 

[36] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

while the Spanish vessels protected by 
the forts prepared to give battle. The 
consternation of the spectators on shore 
was increased by a dense fog which ren- 
dered the approaching ships invisible. 
Our supercargo, who had landed before 
the action began, " was gratified by see- 
ing the whole of it from a balcony on 
the water's edge at little more than half 
gunshot from the enemy. Their balls 
came nearer than was pleasant, not a 
few going over our heads, and some 
entering the houses about us." The 
engagement, lasting only an hour, re- 
sulted in the loss of a few killed and 
wounded on each side, when the ad- 
miral withdrew his ships, saying that 
he had come in only for a reconnois- 
sance. Some days afterwards, by proc- 
lamation, he declared the whole coast 
in a state of blockade. The supercargo 
determined to send his vessel home with 
a cargo of cocoa, and about the 24th of 

[37] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

March she ran the blockade under cover 
of night. This gave him an opportu- 
nity to write long letters to his parents, 
describing his adventures during his ab- 
sence of six months, and expressing 
his anxiety on account of the con- 
dition of his father when he left New 
York. 

He now found himself in a most 
perplexing predicament. He had not 
burned his ships, but, what was as bad, 
he had sent the " Boxer " home, and 
had no alternative but to stay and com- 
plete his business. He had remitted 
the proceeds of a large part of his cargo, 
which had been sold so advantageously 
that he estimated the net profits of his 
principals at one hundred and fifty per 
cent, but unfortunately the Spanish 
government, which had purchased arms 
to the value of $30,000, while acknowl- 
edging its obligation, was without money 
to make payment. To leave the coun- 

[38] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

trv would be to abandon his claim, and 
in remaining he would be subjected not 
only to great personal inconvenience but 
to great anxiety lest an overthrow of the 
existing government should result, as 
it probably would, in the repudiation 
of the debt. A stranger in a strange 
land, ignorant of the language, with no 
friendly adviser, he could only wait and 
hope with all the patience he could 
command. 

Lima, the capital of Peru, founded by 
Hernando Pizarro on the festival of the 
Epiphany in 1535, was originally named 
the City of the Kings, in honor of the 
kings of the Orient. Called by Pres- 
cott "the Beautiful City, the fairest 
gem on the shores of the Pacific/ ' it was 
long renowned for its great wealth, its 
commercial importance, its magnificent 
palaces, churches, and convents, and as 
the seat of the university of San Marco, 
established in 1 551, and remaining to- 

[39] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

day the oldest institution of learning in 
the western hemisphere. 

In 1 819 its glory had departed in 
consequence of volcanic eruptions, earth- 
quakes, internal dissensions, and wars 
with the neighboring provinces. Cal- 
lao, its ancient seaport, a place of con- 
siderable importance, had been destroyed 
by an earthquake seventy years earlier, 
and was now nothing but a filthy, squalid 
landing place. To say that earthquakes 
and revolutions were of daily occurrence 
would be an exaggeration, but Peru had 
long been in a state of physical and po- 
litical unrest. The foundations of Lima 
had been laid deep and strong by Pi- 
zarro, however, and traces of its former 
splendor still remained. 

The climate in January, the summer 
season, was delightful. Although the 
situation was but twelve degrees south 
of the equator, breezes from the Pacific 
on the west and from the Andes on the 

[40] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

east so tempered the air that the heat 
was at no time oppressive. There was 
never any rain and there was never a 
drought, for natural streams from the 
mountains and artificial irrigation pro- 
duced luxuriant vegetation and an abun- 
dance of the choicest fruits and such 
tropical flowers as are never seen in 
higher latitudes except in hot-houses. 

The population of Lima was about 
seventy thousand, half of whom were 
negroes, mulattoes, . and Indians. The 
most respectable were emigrants from 
Spain or were of Spanish descent. It 
was the policy of the government to 
exclude from the country all foreigners, 
and indeed to prohibit exports and 
imports of merchandise except under 
enormous duties. Only about fifty 
other foreigners, admitted by special 
permit, were in Lima at this time. 
As one consequence of their exclusion 
there were no decent hotels or board- 

[41] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

ing houses for their accommodation. 
Whether conditions are now better or 
worse doth not appear, but a newspaper 
recently reported that a traveler in the 
country was temporarily imprisoned 
pending a controversy about his papers. 
On his release he betook himself to a 
hotel, but speedily escaped and asked 
to be readmitted to the greater com- 
forts of the common jail ! 

It was then customary in Lima, how- 
ever, for merchants to receive into their 
own houses captains and supercargos of 
vessels consigned to them, and thus our 
hero became the guest of Don Pedro 
Abadia, a man of wealth, of great ur- 
banity and integrity, the head of an 
important commercial establishment. 
Under the same roof resided his part- 
ner, Mr. Blanco, with his wife and 
four children. Writing of them to 
his mother in August, 1819, he says: 
"I have found them both very honor- 

[42] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

able men and good friends, but even 
in the best educated families there is 
a license in conversation and a freedom 
of speech which astonishes one accus- 
tomed to different habits." 

Under the same date he continues : 

" I am astonished when I reflect that it is 
now almost a year since 1 left New York and 
longer since I have seen you. The novelty 
I have met with has made the time pass 
quickly and pleasantly with the exception 
of the time occupied by my voyage, but the 
scene now begins to alter, the novelty is 
wearing away, and when I consider seriously 
the state of society here and the habits of 
the people I am more than ever desirous of 
being back again in my own country. For 
a considerable time I lived in the house of 
Mr. Abadia. Since then I have taken a 
snug and comfortable house in company 
with a Mr. Mercier of Baltimore, who 
is here on commercial business. He is a 
well-informed, gentlemanly man, and I 
consider myself fortunate in having such a 
companion. 

[43] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

cc I have acquired so much of the lan- 
guage in six months that I can speak it a 
little, and understand it, when spoken, con- 
siderably. In the further space of six 
months I hope to know it very tolerably. 
Amusements are very limited ; the theater 
is miserable ; there are many religious pro- 
cessions and bull-fights. 

" My principal occupation, apart from 
studying the language, is drawing, and I 
hope to give you a perfect idea of the ap- 
pearance of the country, the dresses of the 
inhabitants, and of the Indians of the in- 
terior, by sketches which will have some 
novelty to recommend them." 

Reluctant though he was to remain 
in Lima he became convinced that 
there was an opening there for an ex- 
ceedingly profitable business. Writing 
on this subject to his father he says: 

cc I have embraced this opportunity to 
write particularly to my friends in New 
York, having it in my power to hold out 
very strong inducements to them to make 
further shipments to this country. They 

[44] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

can, if they are not blind to their interests, 
take advantage of the circumstances and 
add another fortune to that they already 
possess. I have told them that the coun- 
try is a most unpleasant one to reside in, 
both on account of the bad state of society 
and of the state of war which it is in, and 
the jealousy of the inhabitants to foreign- 
ers, with other disagreeable circumstances, 
and that nothing but the expectation of 
realizing something extraordinary would 
induce me to remain here any considerable 
time. I think I ought to have twenty per 
cent of the net profit, but am willing to 
leave it to you to make such terms with 
them for me as you think proper." 

His anxiety on this point was not 
relieved, and great was his disappoint- 
ment in December when he was still 
without letters from his principals or 
from any of his family. Writing to 
his sister Maria he says : 

" I hardly need tell you how anxiously I 
am expecting to hear from you. It is now 

[45] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

more than eight months since my vessel left 
this for New York, and should my friends 
have determined on sending her back, as is 
my calculation, she will undoubtedly be here 
this month. If my hopes are realized and 
I hear you are all well and happy it will be 
the greatest pleasure I can possibly enjoy." 

But his hopes were not fullfilled ; the 
inexplicable delay in the arrival of let- 
ters continued ; he was without response 
from his principals; he was unable to 
transact any business, and the possibility 
of collecting his claim was more and 
more questionable. 

At last, however, when his prospects 
were as gloomy as in the darkest days 
off Cape Horn, by the exercise of re- 
markable tact and business sagacity he 
accomplished what had seemed impos- 
sible, and established his reputation as 
a far-seeing man of affairs. The gov- 
ernment, still with an empty treasury, 
was finally induced through the friendly 

[46] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

influence of Don Pedro Abadia to give 
Mr. Coit permission to export a cargo, 
and consented to remit the duty thereon 
in satisfaction of his claim. He had al- 
ready made the acquaintance of Captain 
Cleaveland of Boston, and persuaded 
him to charter a Swedish vessel then in 
port, and load her with cocoa which 
was the only article which could be 
exported in sufficient quantity to answer 
the purpose. Mr. Abadia undertook 
to purchase the cocoa at Guayaquil, six 
hundred miles to the northward, it 
being understood that our hero should 
proceed thither to superintend the load- 
ing, and then set sail for Gibraltar where 
he was to sell his cargo and divide the 
proceeds as the agent of all parties in- 
terested. To accomplish all this as 
successfully as he did demanded busi- 
ness talent of the highest order. 

The Viceroy at the same time gave 
Mr. Coit a license to introduce a cargo 

[47] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

of merchandise into Peru free of duty, 
— a concession which was believed to 
be of considerable value, as he was at 
liberty to use it himself or to dispose 
of it for his own advantage. 

We next hear from him at Guayaquil 
in April, 1820, by a letter to his sister 
Maria, which closes this account of his 
first residence in South America. 1 

"Eighteen months have elapsed since I 
left New York, and I am yet without a line 
from any of my friends in the United 
States or, indeed, any information respecting 
them. 

" My coming to this port is connected 
with a very long voyage I have in view which 
removes to a considerable distance the pleas- 
ing hopes I had entertained of seeing you all 
within a few months. 

" I have engaged with Captain Cleaveland, 
of the ship "Beaver/' to take the consignment 
of a large Swedish ship to be loaded here with 
cocoa for Gibraltar. Should the whole 
of this undertaking be crowned with sue- 

[48] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

cess I shall be enabled to return to my 
native land under circumstances favorable 
beyond my most sanguine hopes when 
leaving it. 

" This port, about six hundred miles north 
of Lima, is situated on a river of the same 
name about eighty miles from the Pacific 
Ocean. The population is twenty thousand, 
a large proportion being indians, mulattoes, 
and negroes. The women, celebrated for 
their beauty are called the Circassians of 
South America. Delicious fruits, pine-ap- 
ples weighing ten or twelve pounds, oranges, 
cocoanuts, and other fruits are in abundance, 
yet I think we should suffer materially in 
an exchange of fruits. They are strangers 
to our fine apples, pears, peaches, plums, and 
apricots, whereas we can generally have the 
best of theirs from the West Indies, though 
not in the same perfection. 

" Education and customs are strikingly dif- 
ferent from ours. Little children are very 
precocious and are taught to dress and act 
like grown men and women. The leading 
traits in the character of the women are van- 
ity and avarice : they are almost without 

4 [49] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

modesty, and even young ladies use language 
that would be shocking to North American 
ears. 

" We are ready to go to sea this morning 
in company with Captain Cleaveland who will 
proceed in the " Beaver " and be the bearer 
of this, while I shall sail for Gibraltar." 

His strictures on society in Guayaquil 
were somewhat mollified, however, by 
the gratifying attentions he received 
from the Rosa Fuerto family, at whose 
house he became a frequent visitor. It 
was rendered exceedingly attractive by 
a large circle of beautiful and well-bred 
women, — sisters, wives, and children, 
— all living under one roof and form- 
ing a delightful society of their own. 

His next letters were to his father 
and mother from Gibraltar at the close 
of September, 1820. In them and in his 
autobiography he records the incidents 
of his voyage in nearly the following 
words: , 

[So] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

"It is with no small pleasure that I ad- 
dress you from this side the Atlantic, and I 
may say my happiness would be complete if 
I could be assured that no unpleasant occur- 
rence has happened in the family in my long 
absence. I have been more particularly anx- 
ious respecting my father, from the distress- 
ing accident which visited him at the moment 
of my leaving New York. 

" This day, September 27, completes two 
years since I left New York, during which 
period I have not received a line from any 
of my friends in the United States. My 
last letters were sent from Guayaquil by 
Captain Cleaveland, but as I hear that he 
put in to Lima leaky probably they never 
reached you. 

" I left Lima on the 5th of March, pro- 
ceeded to Guayaquil, and loaded my ship 
with eight hundred thousand pounds of 
cocoa in bulk, and sailed on April 16 for 
Gibraltar. The voyage of one hundred and 
fifty days was monotonous and tedious. The 
captain gave Cape Horn and the Falkland 
Islands a wide berth, and we crossed the 
equator after three months without having 

[Si] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

sighted land. In a violent gale we were in 
imminent danger; the captain was utterly- 
confused and took refuge in the companion 
way, but finally by some means the vessel 
righted and got on her course. 

"A few days later an alarming sight ap- 
peared. At a distance a long, low, warlike- 
looking craft, having the appearance of a 
privateer, was watching us, and we fully 
expected to be boarded and plundered if 
nothing worse. On she came, then hove 
to, and we could see the boats lowered with 
men in arms. Our case seemed desperate, 
when, to our infinite surprise, after the boats 
had made half the distance to us, a signal was 
given for their return, which was instantly 
complied with. For some cause that we 
were left to conjecture the stranger had taken 
alarm and left us. 

" Near the close of the fifth month, when 
we hoped to arrive at Gibraltar in twenty- 
four hours, a violent " levanter " brought us 
again under close-reefed sails, and we drifted 
at its pleasure. At this time we had a fresh 
alarm in the appearance of two war-vessels 
which we had reason to fear were Algerine 

[52] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

pirates, but to our great relief they took no 
notice of us and passed on their way. 

"This delay of eight days was the more 
annoying as our limited supply of food was 
reduced to poor salt beef, and wormy, very 
wormy, sea-biscuit. But still, I cannot say I 
really suffered ; good health and good appe- 
tite made me relish even this coarse fare. 
Again, when perhaps twenty miles east of 
Gibraltar, the wind and current drifted us 
within range of the guns of the fort off Cadiz. 
In this position we were in danger of being 
boarded by the officers of the fort, and knew 
not what our fate might be, but providen- 
tially a light breeze sprang up and we were 
for a third time relieved from anxiety. In a 
few hours we found ourselves in the port of 
Gibraltar." 

Addressing his mother he says : 

" I expect to go from hence to England, 
and it would be very pleasing to me if I 
could return home from thence and visit 
you all, but I am inclined to believe I shall 
undertake another voyage to Peru in the 
hope it may enable me to return to my 

[S3] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

native land with more reputation and under 
more favorable conditions than I can at 
present. Such being the case, I am sure 
you will acquiesce in the propriety of the 
measure, notwithstanding it may occasion 
you some uneasiness and disappointment. 

" I cannot avoid saying here that I am sen- 
sible of having occasioned you more of those 
painful sensations all my life than either of 
your other children, — certainly not from 
a wish to do so, but perhaps too often from 
a selfish disposition and the result of impru- 
dencies. I assure you I shall never feel en- 
tirely at ease on this point until I have it in 
my power to make some amends by a more 
guided and correct conduct, which I pray a 
kind Providence may afford me the means 
of showing by returning me to you in his 
own good time." 

This was not the language of a home- 
sick child, but the deliberate words of a 
grown man whose warm affection for 
his family and his old home appears 
throughout his correspondence. 

His autobiography gives this account 
[54] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

of his sensations on his arrival at 
Gibraltar. 

"In recalling the experiences of my life 
I cannot recollect hours so full of unalloyed 
happiness as those which I now enjoyed. As 
before stated, I had staked all on this event- 
ful voyage, and now that it had proved suc- 
cessful everything in the future seemed bright 
and hopeful. I was soon to be in the posses- 
sion of what, to a young man, was a hand- 
some capital. I had gained mercantile 
knowledge of a foreign trade that others 
would be desirous to possess, and should 
soon have the pleasure of visiting some of 
the most interesting capitals of the Old 
World. The change in my physical condi- 
tion it is difficult to describe. I was at last 
freed from the discomforts and dangers of a 
most tedious voyage in an old tub of a ship. 
In the place of fare that a beggar would have 
turned his back upon, my table was furnished 
with all the luxuries of a well-supplied mar- 
ket, for scarcely had our anchor struck ground 
when boats were at hand with a profusion of 
meats, bread, fruit ; in fine, everything that a 

[55-] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

famished appetite could crave ; the weather, 
too, was delightful, and the bands in the 
forts enlivened us with their music. 

" My cargo was soon disposed of, with the 
exception of a small venture of my own, 
which I shipped to Bordeaux to avail of a 
better market. I now closed up the affairs 
of the voyage so far as the various parties 
interested were concerned, and, remitting to 
my friends in New York the balance due 
them on the " Boxer's " voyage, was now 
prepared to proceed to Paris and to carry 
my own private views into effect. I deter- 
mined to make the journey by land, as it 
afforded a favorable opportunity of seeing 
something of the interior of France and 
Spain." 

His stay at Gibraltar was not pro- 
longed after he had completed his busi- 
ness, and he then proceeded by mules 
and post chaise, in company with two 
English gentlemen, to Madrid. The 
journey, though fatiguing and rather 
uninteresting, afforded some novel 

[56] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

glimpses of Spanish low life. Progress 
was necessarily slow; the vehicle and 
the harness and manner of driving 
were quite primitive; the driver kept 
up a lively conversation with his mules, 
calling them by their names, and when 
language and gesticulation failed to 
quicken their pace, like the old farmer 
in the fable he tried what virtue there 
was in pelting them with stones. Ac- 
counts came to his notice of robberies 
on the road which were so frequent 
that travelers generally went armed or 
with an escort of cavalry. 

During his stay in Madrid illness 
deprived him of much enjoyment he 
might have had in that interesting city, 
and he greatly regretted his inability to 
visit the Escurial, with its wonderful 
creations of Murillo. He made an 
effort, however, to witness the grand 
and imposing ceremony on the return 
of the king to the capital, attended by 
[57] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

the queen and officers of state, in royal 
carriages, with outriders and other at- 
tendants glittering with gold, rich and 
showy beyond anything he could have 
imagined. 

With his usual good fortune in mak- 
ing friends, he was invited by Mr. For- 
syth, our minister to the court of Spain, 
to accompany him in his private car- 
riage to Bordeaux; but although he 
accepted the invitation, he was com- 
pelled by illness to part company at 
Bayonne, near Biarritz, on the shore of 
the Bay of Biscay. 

After a detention of two weeks he 
proceeded by diligence to Bordeaux, 
where he was cordially received by the 
German house of Classman, to whom 
the cocoa he had shipped from Gib- 
raltar had been consigned. An agree- 
able acquaintance thus formed with Mr. 
Classman's family added much to the 
pleasure of his visit. He met a large 
[58] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

circle of intelligent, polite, and thor- 
oughly well-bred people at his table, 
where he dined frequently, and as it 
was understood he was not quite well, 
a bottle of claret was placed by his side 
for his special use. " But such claret ! 
I had never seen the like. It was a 
perfect bouquet, and its flavor was equal 
to its fragrance ! " 

Writing to his father, he says : 

" You will think that I travel under very 
great disadvantages from the circumstances 
of my having come to Europe without a 
single letter of introduction, and I might 
almost say without even an acquaintance 
(indeed I can with truth say it of that part 
of Europe I have already passed through), 
but I can assure you I have not found the 
least inconvenience on this account. In 
Gibraltar I received the most particular 
attention from all the American and some 
English gentlemen there that letters would 
have given me, and I have brought letters 
here which have, I can venture to say, made 

[59] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

me some very excellent friends that have 
overpowered me with attentions." 

" I also take with me to Paris and London 
sufficient letters to give me an introduction 
to the society of those places. I mention 
this so that you may have no uneasiness on 
my account in this particular." 

He concluded his business in Bor- 
deaux without delay, and then took the 
diligence for Paris, with little expecta- 
tion of disposing of his license there, 
but anticipating much pleasure in seeing 
the wonderful city. Here, again, good 
fortune attended him, for he found in 
Paris Don Pedro Blanco of the house 
of Abadia, and Philip Mercier, both 
of whom he had known intimately in 
Lima. By them he was received with 
the utmost hospitality, and under their 
auspices, to his great enjoyment and 
instruction, he saw all that was best 
worth seeing in the beautiful capital. 
But his hopes were fixed on London, 

[60] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

and thither without much delay he 
directed his steps. 

If on entering the great metropolis 
he had felt considerable elation of spirits 
it would not have been unnatural. He 
was no longer a clerk or an agent for 
principals who were far away, and who 
might or might not approve of his con- 
duct of their affairs, in which he had 
been compelled to assume grave respon- 
sibilities. He was now his own master, 
possessing capital which he himself had 
acquired, and holding a license which, 
as has been seen, he had reason to expect 
would prove valuable. He had tested his 
powers and knew his strength, and had 
good ground for self-confidence, espe- 
cially in his knowledge of men and affairs 
political and commercial in South Amer- 
ica. It was many years later that he said: 

"it surprises me, now, to reflect with what 

boldness and confidence I entered London 

[61] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

where I was utterly unknown, and without 
even the advantage that letters from home 
might have given me. The probability of 
my introducing myself and my business to 
strangers in such a manner as to meet their 
favorable consideration was very slight. My 
friend Mercier had kindly given me a letter 
of introduction to Frederick Huth & Co., 
a house with which he was somewhat ac- 
quainted. This was my only chance for 
making my antecedents known aside from 
my own representations." 

These representations must have been 
made in an exceedingly winning and 
convincing manner. Merchants of large 
affairs are naturally cautious in receiving 
the proposals of strangers ; but his ar- 
dent enthusiasm, his confidence in him- 
self and in the value of the propositions 
he had to submit, were so tempered by 
his deferential courtesy, his accurate 
knowledge of details and his scrupulous 
truthfulness, that he had every reason 
to be gratified by the impression they 

[62] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

made on Mr. Huth, and by the consid- 
erate reception he gave him. 

The partners of the firm of Frederick 
Huth & Co. were German by birth. 
They possessed a large capital and had 
long been established in London, where 
they enjoyed a high reputation among 
merchants. 

After consideration, Mr. Huth's opin- 
ion was that the license was of less value 
than Mr. Coit had believed, as the ne- 
cessities of Peru would compel the 
admission of vessels, license or no li- 
cense ; but he recognized the value of 
Mr. Coit's knowledge and experience, 
and offered him a compensation of 
$3,500 for his time and services in 
selecting and purchasing a cargo for 
shipment thither. This offer exceeded 
his expectations and the arrangement 
was concluded forthwith. 

As the condition of affairs in Peru 
did not encourage immediate action in 

[63] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

sending a cargo thither, he improved 
several weeks of leisure in seeing some- 
thing of the country. He visited Hull, 
Leeds, Manchester, Chester, and Liver- 
pool, finding in all these places so much 
that was novel and interesting that the 
time passed pleasantly, especially in vis- 
iting the great manufacturing towns. 

" Leeds," he said, " is filled with smoke 
and dirt and appears like a great workshop, 
but the neighboring country is very fine with 
numerous elegant buildings and country 
seats, — withal a good hunting and shooting 
country. These sports are now out of sea- 
son, or I should have desired to devote a few 
days to them. You perceive I make good 
the old saying that c as the twig is bent the 
tree 's inclined/ Perhaps I am more dis- 
posed to be pleased with Liverpool from the 
very flattering manner in which I have been 
received here, and a most hospitable recep- 
tion from Mr. Woolsey and his good family. 
Our cousin Abby Woolsey is a most excel- 
lent and lovely woman, and since my recent 

[6 4 ] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

intercourse with her I am more than ever 
sensible of the loss her friends sustain in 
being deprived of her society. I have cor- 
responded with her since my return to 
London, having consented to expose my 
own poverty in letter writing for the sat- 
isfaction her letters have afforded me. In a 
recent one she says, ' You must let me know 
if you hear from your own family. Do not 
forget to remember me with sincere affec- 
tion to each one, but particularly my always 
dearly beloved aunt/ " 

His business in London was not so 
engrossing but that he had leisure for 
amusement and for seeing all that was 
most worthy of attention in the great 
city. He was particularly fortunate in 
having an opportunity of witnessing the 
imposing ceremonies on the occasion 
of the coronation of King George IV. 
in Westminster Abbey in July, 1821. 
By great good fortune through the 
kindness of his friends he obtained a 
seat that proved to be one of the best 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

in the house, and the magnificence of 
the spectacle amply repaid him for the 
tedious delay in waiting from daylight 
to eleven o'clock. As the King was 
leaving the Abbey in procession he 
was gratified with a near view of him 
while the walls were echoing shouts of 
" God save the King ! " " Long live King 
George ! " 

In the following September the ex- 
pedition for Lima, in which he had 
been interested, was ready for sea, and 
he was tempted by very favorable pro- 
posals from the owners to join it. But 
he had other prospects in view, and 
remembered with anything but pleasure 
his last tedious voyage of five months 
from Peru. His experience at sea 
might have taught him to say with 
Shylock: "Ships are but boards, sail- 
ors but men : there be land rats and 
water rats, water thieves and land 
thieves, I mean pirates : and then, there 
[66] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

is the peril of waters, winds and 
rocks. " 

The object he had in view was to 
establish himself, with the advice and 
assistance of the good friends he had 
made in England, Mr. Huth and others, 
in commercial business in Gibraltar, 
and to Gibraltar he proceeded by way 
of Paris where he was detained much 
longer than he had expected on account 
of the unhealthy condition of Spain. He 
had no reason to regret the detention, 
however, as will appear hereafter. It 
is interesting to contrast his opinions of 
Paris with those expressed by his father 
forty years earlier, and printed in the 
memoir of Daniel Lathrop Coit. 

" I continue much pleased with Paris and 
give it preference over London as a place of 
residence. There is such a variety of objects 
to amuse and engage the admiration in the 
magnificent and numerous public edifices, 
gardens, and streets, as well as in the exhi- 

[67] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

bitions of fine arts collected from all parts of 
the world, such as are not to be met with in 
any other country. Indeed, the round of 
pleasureable enjoyments is such that foreign- 
ers particularly, and not infrequently our 
countrymen who come here solely for amuse- 
ments, give themselves up too much to them 
and commit very great follies. Yet, not- 
withstanding this, Paris is still a place of 
greater industry than perhaps any other. 
Manufactures are carried on to a great ex- 
tent. The women are more industrious and 
their time more devoted to profitable em- 
ployment than in any other country. Paris 
must be much altered and improved since 
you were here. A principal improvement 
made by the late Emperor, besides fine public 
buildings and monuments, are the piers of 
free stone on both sides of the Seine, the 
whole length of the city." 

On his journey to Paris he stopped 
for two or three days at Southampton 
and the Isle of Wight, and passed the 
time very agreeably in sketching from 
nature. At Newport he was diverted 
[68] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

by the annual fair, lasting three days 
and made a frolic, in which servants 
from all parts of the island are engaged 
for a whole year, — a novel perform- 
ance, similar to the scene represented 
in the opera of " Martha." 

To his great surprise he was recalled 
from Paris by letters from Mr. Huth 
so urgent and important that he had no 
alternative but to abandon his plans for 
Gibraltar, and return immediately to 
London. Mr. Huth's proposition was 
nothing less than that they should form 
a copartnership to last for six years, for 
the transaction of a commercial business 
in Valparaiso and Lima, under the firm 
name of Frederick Huth, Coit & Com- 
pany. His share of the profits was to 
be thirty-two per cent. A vessel with 
a valuable cargo was to be fitted out 
immediately and he was to go out in 
her and have full control of the business 
in Lima where he would make his 

[6 9 ] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

residence. As the existing house of 
Frederick Huth & Co. possessed ample 
resources, and enjoyed the highest 
reputation as merchants in England, 
Germany, and Spain, the success of 
the enterprise seemed to be assured in 
advance. Such a proposition, coming 
from such a source, was not less grat- 
ifying than surprising, and although 
it deferred for a long period all hope 
of his return to the United States, there 
could be no question as to the propriety 
of its immediate acceptance. 

In company with Mr. Huth he then 
visited the principal manufacturing 
towns in England, making purchases 
for shipment and negotiating for further 
consignments. Arrangements were per- 
fected for sending a large and valuable 
cargo in a fine English ship in which 
he was to sail, and he estimated his 
own share of the profits on that cargo 
alone at not less than ten thousand 

[70] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

dollars. Writing from London in 
May, 1822, he says: 

"I confess I am a little surprised to find 
people willing to adventure their property at 
this moment so freely to a market so distant, 
and from which the accounts have been very 
unfavorable, but so it is, and I have no doubt 
I shall have as many goods shipped to me as 
I can possibly dispose of, even if a million 
sterling, per annum. ... It may be consid- 
ered a singular circumstance, situated as I 
have been in England, a stranger, coming 
here without the advantages I might have 
had from letters had I come direct from the 
United States, that I should so soon have 
had two offers from different houses of the 
first respectability to form establishments 
abroad and take the entire responsibility of 
them,, but such has been the case." 

He and Mr. Huth continued their 
tour as far as Liverpool, where they 
received every civility from Mr. and 
Mrs. Woolsey. Mr. Woolsey strongly 
advised them to change their arrange- 

[71] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

ments in favor of Mexico, and proposed 
to take an interest in promoting an 
establishment there; but Mr. Huth's 
plans were already irrevocably fixed. 

There was unavoidable delay in mak- 
ing the cargo ready for shipment, com- 
ing as it did from different points, part 
of it from Hamburg, and it was not 
until early in June, 1822, that the 
"Ship Catharine, Robert Young, mas- 
ter, from London to the coast of Chile 
and Peru," with Mr. Coit, and a gen- 
tleman whom he had consented to 
receive on board as a passenger, took 
her departure. 

His last letter to his family from 
London is dated May 26. He says : 

" I have heretofore mentioned to you the 
high reputation as an author which our coun- 
tryman, Mr. Washington Irving of New 
York, has established for himself in England 
by the publication of his ' Sketch Book/ I 
am happy to say he has now added not a little 

[72] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

to his fame by a new work which he calls 
c Bracebridge Hall/ By reading early and 
late I have got through it, my engagements 
to the contrary notwithstanding, and can 
truly say I never laughed and wept more at 
one and the same book in my life. I am 
willing to think I am not altogether an im- 
partial judge of the work from the friendship 
and esteem I have for the author and the 
interest I feel in his success, and, indeed, 
in all that relates to him. 

" It would have been a great gratification 
to me if I could have looked in upon you in 
Norwich, if but for a very short time, pre- 
vious to this undertaking ; but under this 
deprivation your letters just received are a 
greater consolation than you can imagine. 
To learn that our dear mother's health is 
even better than usual is, at this particular 
moment, the greatest pleasure that could have 
occurred to me. May a kind Providence, 
my dear sister, watch over and preserve us 
all to a happy meeting, at some future day." 

One more letter, and this the last 
from London, was to Mrs. Woolsey 
[73] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

on the 2d of June. He acknowledges 
the courtesies extended to him and Mr. 
Huth in Liverpool, and, with affec- 
tionate farewells, sends her a copy of 
"Bracebridge Hall. ,, 

There is some reason to conjec- 
ture that the impossibility of maintain- 
ing close and frequent communication 
with his principals, Messrs. Howland 
and Harmony, during his first so- 
journ in Lima, resulted in misunder- 
standing on their part, and in criticism 
which he could not but regard as 
unwarranted and entirely unjust. It 
was gratifying to him therefore, on 
the eve of his departure from Eng- 
land, to receive from his Howland 
cousins renewed expressions of friend- 
ship, good will, and confidence, with 
cordial congratulations on his pros- 
perity. 

In the same connection his father 
wrote to him : 

[74] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

" Your very good friend, G. G. Howland, 
who passed through town recently, took oc- 
casion to congratulate me on the very hon- 
orable conduct manifested by you in this 
transaction. It had immortalized you even 
in New York, and placed your character in 
a most shining and conspicuous light, and 
given you almost unbounded credit and 
eclat. ,, 

A long interval, nearly four months, 
elapsed before the date of the traveler's 
next letter, September 29, 1822, from 
Monte Video. Of this letter there re- 
mains only a fragment, which suffices 
to show that v the tedious voyage was 
interrupted by a violent gale as they ap- 
proached Cape Horn which so strained 
the ship as to make it necessary to re- 
turn to the Rio de la Plata for repairs. 

At midnight, through the ignorance 
or incompetence of the captain, the 
vessel ran upon a reef on the island of 
Flores and for a time seemed to be in 

[75] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

imminent peril, but by means almost 
miraculous was righted and proceeded 
to Monte Video, not far distant. There, 
as it was found necessary to discharge 
the cargo and repair the vessel, he was 
detained for a month under conditions 
that were not altogether agreeable, 
though he lived in the house of an 
English gentleman who took charge 
of the ship, — " his wife an agreeable 
lady, much superior to most foreign 
women in Spanish countries, who are 
apt to become negligent in neatness and 
propriety, or what we should esteem so, 
and fall more or less into the customs 
of the natives. I really do not think 
there are a dozen very good-looking 
women in all Monte Video, and not 
half that number that would be called 
pretty with us. A very handsome per- 
son there is not ! " He had not forgot- 
ten the early lessons in propriety that 
he had learned at home, nor the attrac- 

[76] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

tive graces of the girls he had left 
behind him ! 

Although the damage to his ship and 
cargo was not very serious, the deten- 
tion at Monte Video gave him an op- 
portunity to modify his plans for the 
continuance of his journey. He had 
already made two disagreeable voyages 
around Cape Horn ; and he now goes 
on to say : 

"You will readily imagine after all my 
trials I am ready to grasp at almost any ex- 
pedient to avoid another journey around 
Cape Horn, and will be pleased that I pro- 
pose to go from hence to Buenos Ayres, 
about one hundred miles up the river, and 
from thence by land to Valparaiso, there to 
have the ship meet me." 

He was evidently undismayed by the 
captain's unfortunate attempt to navi- 
gate the ship overland in proposing to 
go overland himself! 

[77] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

"The journey is no trifling one, being 
about sixteen hundred miles, to be per- 
formed on horseback : however, I can un- 
dergo fatigue of body better than anxiety 
of mind; severe exertion never injures 
me, and I think I was never in better con- 
dition to bear it than at present." 

Having put his ship in order to pro- 
ceed on her voyage, he left Monte 
Video and went up the river to Buenos 
Ayres, where he remained a fortnight 
waiting for traveling companions, and 
there he received favorable news from 
Peru promising an excellent trade and 
a liberal profit on the merchandise he 
had shipped. 

" These you will acknowledge are bright 
prospects, and should they be realized only 
in part I shall soon be more independent in 
a pecuniary point of view than I have ever 
been, and shall be able, I hope, to return to 
my own country, a wish that is now dearest 
to my heart." 

[78] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

His traveling party, besides himself, 
consisted of three American gentlemen, 
and numbered nine in all, including 
drivers and servants, fully armed and 
prepared to resist any attack from the 
roving bands of lawless savages that in- 
fested the country. They were also 
provided with bedding, cooking uten- 
sils, provisions, and other indispensables 
for the journey. The alarming reports 
of robberies and murders on the road 
almost made him wish that he had gone 
with the ship, but it was now too late. 

On the 29th of November, 1822, all 
things being in readiness, he began his 
memorable journey across the continent 
of South America. It was his birthday, 
and he wrote : 

" It may not occur to you, and I therefore 
remind you that I am writing on my birth- 
day. I feel sensibly the rapidity with which 
time passes, and when I reflect how little I 

[79] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

have done to any good purpose at this ad- 
vanced age, I am startled and cannot be with- 
out apprehension for the future. Still, I 
have great reason to be thankful for many, 
very many things, and, if my present pros- 
pects are realized only in part, I shall have 
it in my power to return before a very long 
time to a life which is dearest to my heart." 

He could not imagine what vicissi- 
tudes the next fifty years of his life 
would bring ! 

Not even the anticipation of robbers, 
who fortunately did not come, could 
make the long carriage drive over the 
pampas from Buenos Ayres to Mendoza, 
at the foot of the eastern Cordillera, 
anything but monotonous and weari- 
some. These vast plains afforded grass 
for herds of innumerable cattle, and 
especially wild horses, and the chief 
diversion at the frequent post-houses 
was to see two or three men, when a 
relay was called for, ride off into a herd 

[so] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

and drive in one or two hundred of all 
sizes and descriptions, and capture such 
as were desirable with their unerring 
lassoes. 

Mendoza, a large inland town, was 
and had long been a halting-place for 
travelers who were about to cross the 
Andes. Here the country was in a high 
state of cultivation, abounding in fields 
of grain, orchards, and vineyards. It was 
the destination of two of his party, and, 
after two days' rest, Mr. Coit, with a 
Lieutenant Nixon of the United States 
navy, who had been in the company, 
mounted their horses and with their 
guides began the exciting ascent over 
the Uspallata Pass. 

After seventy-five years, on the 
summit of this pass at an altitude of 
thirteen thousand feet above the sea, 
on the boundary line between Chile 
and Argentina symbolizing peace be- 
tween those countries, stands to-day, 
6 [81] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

supported by a cross, a colossal statue 
of Christ! 

Not far distant in the south was the 
volcanic mountain, San Jose, twenty 
thousand feet high, and in the north 
towered Aconcagua, nearly twenty-four 
thousand feet, supposed to be the high- 
est peak in the western hemisphere. 
Over this route, traversed by Mr. Coit 
in twenty-one days, eighty-six years ago, 
a railway now in course of construction 
is so near completion that a recent trav- 
eler in midwinter, climbing the most 
arduous part on his feet, and using the 
railway in the ascent and descent, did 
what had been believed to be impossi- 
ble and crossed the continent in five 
days. 

Huge masses of rock hurled from 
the summits to the valleys far below in 
many places obstructed the road and 
gave abundant evidence of a recent 
earthquake. Of this he received full 

[82] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

intelligence at Santiago, a fine city 
ninety miles in the interior, and on his 
arrival at Valparaiso, his destination, 
he witnessed its appalling results, the 
city lying in ruins, and the inhabitants 
destitute of food, shelter, and clothing. 

It is not without surprise and regret, 
considering his artistic appreciation of 
the picturesque and sublime in natural 
scenery, and his power of narration 
which could make a remembered scene 
seem actually visible, that we find in 
his letters that still exist next to noth- 
ing of the wonderful region, then almost 
unknown to civilized men, through 
which he had passed. He plainly 
intimated that he might give a further 
account of his journey at a future day, 
but no trace of it has been found. 

In interesting contrast with the ex- 
perience of her kinsman, Mr. Coit, is 
Mrs. Faith Ripley Atterbury's charming 
account of her twice crossing the South 

[83] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

American continent with her husband, 
about eighty years later, over nearly the 
same route, but under very different 
conditions. The panorama of the 
Andes as seen from the Pacific between 
Valparaiso and Lima was not less glo- 
rious than in his day, but those ancient 
cities, while retaining remains of their 
former grandeur, had been transformed 
by commercial enterprise and modern 
civilization into gay and brilliant capi- 
tals. Even Callao, which he had found 
no better than " a filthy, squalid land- 
ing-place,' ' called forth her cordial 
approval as " quaint, little Spotless 
Town," looking so cosy and attractive 
and friendly that she was loath to 
leave it. 

Mr. Coit's ship made a good passage 
around the cape and reached Valparaiso 
shortly before he did, a fortunate cir- 
cumstance, as it enabled him to go on 
board at once and make his home there 

[8 4 ] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

during his stay in the city, which was 
prolonged beyond his expectations in 
consequence of the unsettled condition 
of political affairs in Peru and incessant 
conflicts between the royalists and the 
revolutionists. The detention was not 
detrimental to his interests, however, for 
his cargo found an excellent market. 
He says : " I live constantly on the ship 
and am comfortable in all respects. With 
the troubles of others ringing in my ears 
I have reason to be thankful that my 
individual concerns are more than fa- 
vorable." The sufferings that he wit- 
nessed on every side appealed to his 
sympathy, and he took much pleasure 
in rendering substantial assistance to the 
United States consul and his family, who 
had lost everything by the earthquake. 
The United States seventy -four gun ship 
" Franklin/' Commodore Stewart, was 
in port at this time, and with him and 
his family he had a friendly acquaint- 
[8 5 ] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

ance, as also with the family of the 
consul. 

He remained three months in Valpa- 
raiso and then went north to Quilea, 
the port of Arequipa, where his ship 
delivered a portion of her cargo. Be- 
fore he could collect the amount 
due to him the persons to whom he 
had made sales found it necessary for 
their safety from the opposing army to 
make their escape from Arequipa, and, 
choosing not to lose sight of them, 
he followed them to the ancient city 
of Cuzco, formerly the seat of the 
Incas, the native kings, who ruled 
the country for hundreds of years be- 
fore the Spanish conquest. The four 
months that he spent there gave him 
full opportunity to survey the ruins 
of the once great and magnifi- 
cent city, its fortress, its palaces, its 
churches, and the famous Temple of 
the Sun. 

[86] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

In December, 1823, after an absence 
of more than three and a half years, he 
found himself once more within the 
walls of the city of Lima, with sensa- 
tions very different from those with 
which he had left it. He was then 
making a bold venture in which he 
could not be fully confident of suc- 
cess ; he returned at the head of an 
important establishment which had 
already yielded handsome profits and 
now opened more brilliant prospects. 

Writing to his mother he says : 

" I assure you, my dear mother, I have 
felt much gratified by the particulars you 
have given me of your family group and of 
our immediate friends and neighbors in whom 
I shall always feel a lively interest. It also 
affords me much pleasure that in being sep- 
arated from your own sons, you should have 
found in Mr. Gilman all that an own son 
should be. I feel this as the kindest favor 
he could do me, and I shall never be for- 
getful of it." 

[87] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

To his father, after speaking of the 
outlook for good business as exceeding 
his expectations, he says: 

c< I had advanced pretty well in the knowl- 
edge of the Spanish language before leaving 
this for Europe, at any rate sufficiently to 
transact my business in it and carry on a 
conversation with any one; but the French, 
which I acquired to a certain extent while in 
Europe rather confused my Spanish, and 
that, with want of practice for so long a time 
put me back very much. However, I have 
recovered what I lost, and am, I think, more 
advanced than before." 

Except for a comparatively short trip 
to Quilea, the following years of his 
life in South America were spent in 
Lima. Here he occupied a large and 
commodious house after the Spanish 
fashion with a family that usually num- 
bered about twenty. Household ex- 
penses were enormous, but commissions 
were large in proportion, and he sub- 
[88] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

mitted without much repining to what- 
ever inconvenience as part of the regular 
course of business, hoping it might the 
sooner enable him to accomplish his 
ardent desire to return to his native 
land. Writing to his mother at two 
o'clock in the morning, he says : " Our 
business keeps our house constantly 
thronged with captains and supercar- 
goes, who give me not a moment's 
leisure or peace except when I am 
in bed." 

Although he engaged in no specu- 
lative ventures for himself or for his 
firm, his constantly increasing commis- 
sion business taxed his powers to the 
utmost. In February, 1825, he had 
eight vessels in port consigned to him 
with cargoes amounting to $400,000. 
In August he names eleven more, and 
in the January following he was over- 
whelmed with business, cargoes com- 
ing from the United States, England, 

[89] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

France, and Germany exceeding a mil- 
lion of dollars. Although he did not 
think it possible in April, 1826, that 
his firm could ever have another three 
months' business as profitable as the 
last, yet after eighteen months he could 
say, "the present year is the best we 
have ever had," and he entertained great 
hopes that the final six months of his 
partnership would be " a very handsome 
winding up." All this is the more re- 
markable because of disturbances and 
conflicts between the opposing political 
parties, and the constant fluctuation in 
the prices of all commodities imported 
into the country. It had been a period 
of great financial distress in Lima. Very 
many families who had been in affluent 
circumstances when he first came to the 
country were now reduced to want and 
beggary. 

Not less gratifying than his material 
prosperity was the cordial approbation 

[90] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

of all his acts and proceedings repeatedly 
expressed by his partners in London. In 
a private letter to him, in April, 1826, 
Mr. Huth wrote: 

" Let me assure you your letters always 
give me the greatest pleasure, they are so 
interesting, both from their important con- 
tents and from the masterly manner and style 
in which they are written. . . . Could we 
but have peace and harmony in Peru what a 
wide field would be open for you and for us : 
as it is, we must not complain, we have had 
hard work to set things agoing, but by de- 
grees I trust it will be easier, and rest assured, 
no effort shall be wanting on our part to sup- 
port the establishment. ... I conclude with 
the renewed tender of my most sincere friend- 
ship, and with the assurance that no one can 
possibly take a livelier interest in your 
welfare." 

His partnership was to expire by limi- 
tation on the eleventh day of April, 1828, 
and to that day he looked forward with 
the eagerness of a school-boy expectant 

[91] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

of his vacation. The years of his ab- 
sence were now reduced to months, and, 
as he counted them, he declared that 
nothing would induce him to remain in 
Lima beyond the term of his original 
agreement. In this connection he says : 

" What changes have not a few years pro- 
duced in my situation ! To look back seven 
years to when I first arrived in this country 
a stranger, with but a small cargo under my 
direction, and now, to find myself at the head 
of an establishment doing more business than 
any other in Peru, and actually giving assist- 
ance to the family of him who was at the 
head of commerce and one of the richest 
men in the country at that time, Don Pedro 
Abadia ! " 

He was much interested in hearing 
from his parents the details of their jour- 
ney to Ohio in 1826, when they visited 
his brother Henry. " If any one had 
predicted, when father made his first 
journey there in 1801, that it might 

[92] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

become a pleasure jaunt for ladies, that 
person would have been thought cracked, 
at least." 

He was also concerned by their ac- 
count of his brother Henry, whose pros- 
pects were somewhat unpromising, and 
wrote : 

cc He certainly has an unusual capability 
for business, and I regret that he is not 
where he can exercise it. . . . It must be a 
heavy charge to have a growing family with- 
out more means than he possesses, and it will 
be very gratifying to me if I can aid in plac- 
ing him in an eligible situation. Remember 
me affectionately to him and his family and 
say that on my return I shall not be long 
without making him a visit." 

To his mother he says : 

" I have just got out from England a nice 
camera lucida, a new invention for taking 
landscapes and figures with despatch and 
much precision, and I intend to add con- 
siderably to my collection of views in this 
neighborhood before I leave it, so you will 

[93] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

perceive the cares of business have not de- 
prived me of my fondness for this favorite 
amusement; and will you be offended or 
think me frivolous if I tell you that I would 
like of all things a fine day's sport with my 
dog and gun by way of recreation after the 
tolerable spell of business I have had ? This, 
you know, was a passion which began early 
with me, and, it is best to be candid, I believe 
it will last late. However, you will admit 
that I can lay it aside when business or duty 
bid. . . . But the clock strikes twelve, and 
reminds me it is bedtime." 

The business prosperity of his firm 
was unabated, and his partners offered 
him flattering inducements to continue 
the partnership for at least another year ; 
but he was firm in his resolution to 
return home at the earliest possible 
moment. To that end he closed his 
private affairs and made remittances of 
his funds, some to Gibraltar and Eng- 
land, but the greater part he proposed to 
carry with him in specie, gold and silver 

[94] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

bullion, coined silver, and sealskins. He 
speaks almost apologetically of his affairs 
to his father, " for not to tell you would 
be to deprive you of a pleasure.' ' 

Late at night, on the 28th of April, 
with only half an inch of candle re- 
maining, he writes : 

"You are aware that my copartnership 
expired on the 1 1 inst., and of course since 
that period I have had no connection with 
my former house, but, notwithstanding, the 
captains and supercargoes will not let me rest, 
and I have exactly the same direction in the 
new house that I had in the old, and though 
I wish it were otherwise it will unavoidably 
continue so while I am here. . . . Since 
my last we have had a dreadful earthquake. 
You can hardly form an idea of the horror 
of it, the ground rising and falling with 
undulations like the sea ; houses and parts 
of houses falling ; clouds of dust rising in all 
directions ; people running naked into the 
streets, some screeching, others crying, and 
all beseeching for mercy. Such a scene I 
never wish to witness again. 

[95] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

Since the earthquake we were very nigh 
having another revolution, and there is no 
telling what dreadful consequences might 
have ensued had it taken effect. Do you 
wonder that I wish to get out of such a 
country where earthquakes and revolutions 
are of almost daily occurrence, to say nothing 
of numerous lesser evils ? " 

In a letter to his brother he gives an 
interesting narrative of his personal ex- 
perience in this earthquake. He had 
risen at an early hour with the purpose 
of making a sketch from a lofty tower 
which commanded a fine view of the 
city and river at the end of a bridge 
crossing the Reimac. It could be 
reached only by long, dreary passages 
and various staircases and trapdoors in 
an old convent. While seated at his 
work in this dangerous position the 
trembling of the tower and the rum- 
bling of the earthquake warned him of 
its approach. So sudden and violent 
was the shock that, leaving his sketch 

[96] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

and implements while the walls and 
roofs were falling about him, he had 
barely time to make a descent that was 
far from facile and escape through the 
ruins to the street. " He was after- 
wards so fortunate as to recover his 
unfinished sketch, which he completed 
under more favorable conditions, and it 
remains as an excellent view of the 
cathedral and an interesting memorial 
of the event." 

Early in June, 1828, he embarked at 
Lima in the " Danube/' one of Good- 
hue & Co.'s ships, for New York, via 
Cape Horn, and took leave of South 
America forever. No seaman on a 
man-of-war in a foreign port ever saw 
the " homeward-bound pennant" at the 
royal masthead with greater joy. 

An affectionate letter to his mother, 
especially interesting because it is per- 
sonal, closes this narrative of his expe- 
7 [97] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

riences in South America and his ten 
years' absence from home : 

" It now really seems like returning home 
in earnest, and perhaps when you receive, 
and may be reading, this I shall be already 
on the way. . . . You will not hesitate to 
believe me when I tell you what sensations 
agitate me when I reflect on the changes 
which a few months are likely to produce in 
my situation and happiness. The setting 
foot on my native land again, the meeting 
with old acquaintances, the embraces of the 
family, of you, my dear Mother. . . . Per- 
haps I ought to prepare you to expect con- 
siderable change in myself. I certainly have 
retained my hair and my teeth, but then 
time has committed its usual ravages. I 
have not made so many tedious voyages and 
journeys and passed through so many differ- 
ent climates without carrying in my face some 
marks of my cares and anxieties. ... As 
to finding my habits or manners changed or 
assimilated to those of the people among 
whom I have been so long, that you need 
not expect. I am pretty clear in this respect 
and do not fear to be taken for a Spaniard. 

[98] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

. . . Although I shall retire from all direct 
interest with any house in the Pacific I shall 
maintain relations with several, and I have 
besides several important agencies offered 
me from which I expect a handsome and 
sure income without putting at hazard the 
property I have acquired which is itself suffi- 
cient for my reasonable wants, even supposing 
me as speaking as a man of family. When 
this last supposition will be realized I can at 
present form no idea ; perhaps never ; but 
do not think that I mean to despair, although 
I am an old bachelor. A good establishment 
has charms for those who have not one, and, 
I assure you, I do think a man of forty, yes, 
forty, with such is fully a match for one of 
thirty without. As I never expect to be 
thirty again you will allow me to say so. 
Will you present my best love to Elizabeth 
and her family, and believe me 



tfLfasw 







[99] 



DANIEL WADS WORTH COIT 

His absence of more than ten years 
was a period of no little anxiety to his 
family in Norwich. His letters, at long 
intervals, gave intimations year after 
year of hairbreadth escapes from disas- 
trous chances and moving accidents, but 
they left ample room for the imagina- 
tion to conjure up worse calamities that 
might have befallen him. His father 
wrote : 

" I am well aware that your situation and 
trials must have been arduous and perplexing, 
and I am concerned lest you shall be op- 
pressed beyond your health and strength 
with the immense concerns on your hands. 
The wretched state of the government of 
Peru also causes anxiety for your personal 
safety and possible loss of property. The 
greatest caution, forecast, and watchfulness, 
in addition to constant application seem 
necessary in the management of such exten- 
sive concerns. You have, however, passed 
through the school of experience and have 
given good evidence that you have profited 
[ioo] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

by it, not only to your friends in this quarter 
of the world, but to the fast friends you have 
made abroad." 

His sister Maria, speaking of their 
parents, says: "As respects their chil- 
dren they have but one wish ungratified. 
I need not say it is the return of their 
son. . . . We have the subject much at 
heart, and we hope the declining years 
of our parents will be cheered by having 
you soon among us." His happy return 
in health and prosperity in the month 
of November needed not the Gover- 
nor's proclamation to make the family 
reunion an occasion of sincere thanks- 
giving ; and it may well be believed that 
never were the tales of a traveler, illus- 
trated with his own sketches, listened 
to with deeper interest. 

He had already intimated that it 
might become expedient for him to go 
to London at an early day at the re- 

[IOI] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

quest of Mr. Huth, who desired to con- 
sult him in regard to his successors in 
Lima and the expediency of establishing 
a mercantile house in New York. The 
perils and dangers of the sea had no 
more terrors for him, as " in the present 
state of navigation the voyage to Europe 
is little more than a jaunt of pleasure ! " 
Accordingly he sailed for London in 
May, 1829, m uch to the regret of his 
mother, whose maternal solicitude was 
not diminished by " a dream that he 
was dead, which made her gloomy all 
day." Inasmuch as he survived her by 
thirty years, her grandchildren regret 
that her undeviating sweetness and se- 
renity were disturbed for a moment by 
the baseless fabric of a dream. 

His father, who had made a study of 
the culture of silkworms, not only theo- 
retically but by practical experiment, 
urged him to investigate the methods 
employed in Europe. He also desired 
[102] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

him to inform himself fully as to the 
cultivation of the grape and the making 
of wine in the countries through which 
he might pass. Some years later he 
did experiment with mulberry trees and 
silkworms, but with no more encourag- 
ing success than his father had twenty 
years earlier. It was demonstrated that 
silk could be produced, but not with a 
commercial profit at that time for lack 
of cheap labor. Whatever knowledge 
he acquired of grape culture he was en- 
abled to make practically useful at a 
subsequent period in Norwich in his 
hot-houses. A connoisseur was heard to 
say that he doubted not for a moment 
that what Mr. Coit offered him was the 
pure juice of the grape, but however 
that might be it certainly was not wine ! 
There is no reason to suppose that the 
making either of wine or of silk was 
long continued. 

Mr. Coit's departure from New York 
[^3] - 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

was made noteworthy by circumstances 
that can never occur again : four beauti- 
ful packet ships bound for European 
ports, beating down the bay within 
pistol-shot of each other, prepared, not 
for an ocean race, but for an " experi- 
ment " as to their sailing qualities ! 
Great was the interest among the pas- 
sengers for four-and-twenty hours, but 
as the wind increased, the Columbian — 
it seems almost superfluous to say that 
she was Mr. Coit's vessel — " walked 
away from the others and maintained 
the high reputation she had held as a 
first-rate ship for speed." 

His stay in Europe was prolonged 
much beyond his expectation, a possible 
absence of one year being extended to 
three. It is to be regretted that a large 
portion of his journal kept during this 
interesting tour is missing, and that but 
few of his letters from the continent 
have been found, but existing letters 
[104] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

addressed to him by members of his 
family, especially by his sister Maria, 
an ever faithful and affectionate corre- 
spondent, indicate his travels in Scot- 
land, Ireland, France, Italy, Germany, 
Switzerland, and on the Rhine. He 
enjoyed to the highest degree the works 
of art in these countries, and not only 
continued his agreeable pastime of 
sketching from nature, but pursued the 
study of art under the best teachers. 
His well-filled portfolios, and the val- 
uable paintings by old masters which 
he purchased and sent home, afforded 
life-long pleasure to himself and his 
friends. Until his return they covered 
the walls of his sister Maria's house in 
New York and were much admired 
by many visitors. She speaks particu- 
larly of Murillo's "Holy Family " as 
"quite enchanting in a bright sunny 
morning," and of " Saint John with the 
lamb" as one of her special favorites. 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

"You have all witnessed," writes his 
brother, Joshua Coit, " your uncle's passion 
for sketching from nature which was one of 
the most enduring of his favorite pursuits. 
At one time he, together with Mr. Fisher, 
of Philadelphia, and Mr. Alleyn Otis, of 
Boston, both gentlemen of culture, made a 
tour through the borders of the Rhine, Switz- 
erland, and Italy. They had their own car- 
riage and stopped on their route at discretion. 
I was well acquainted with Mr. Otis, who 
used to take pleasure in telling me of the 
agreeable, companionable qualities of my 
brother, and of their interest in witnessing 
his zeal in this occupation. Hardly would 
they stop for rest or refreshment, when he 
would be off, sketch-book and pencil in hand, 
for an artistic point of view, and seldom failed 
to bring away a more or less finished sketch 
and memento of figure or landscape." 

His father was deeply interested in 
his travels, and followed him as well as 
he could with " Moore's Travels in 
France and Italy," — "a pleasant 
writer, whose observations on the whole 
[106] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

appear sensible, natural, and amusing." 
Much as he desired his son's return, 
hoping he would " never again leave 
home for such a distant excursion," he 
nevertheless encouraged him to make 
the most of " an opportunity that prob- 
ably would not occur again to lay up 
a stock of information not only as 
respects business, but of men and 
manners, from which to draw with 
satisfaction, delight, and amusement 
for a good while to come." With 
quiet humor he adds, "Should you pass 
over to Ireland and spend a few weeks 
among that people famed for their hos- 
pitality, steer clear of all mobs, riots, 
and so forth, and, finally, return in 
safety, you will find it an agreeable tour, 
and add much to your acquirements. 

He spent the month of October, 1830, 
in Switzerland, and, " having done pen- 
ance long enough in diligences and 
public carriages, exposed to the smoke 
[107] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

and vulgarity of disagreeable people, he 
bought a very strong but at the same 
time very good and handsome traveling 
carriage," that he might move about 
at his convenience, stopping when and 
where he pleased to make sketches, or 
to walk across country and climb moun- 
tains in search of picturesque effects. 
Rising with the sun to secure a view 
before continuing his journey, or leav- 
ing the dinner table to make a sketch 
from the window of the inn, or improv- 
ing another opportunity before night- 
fall, he succeeded not infrequently in 
making at least two or three sketches 
in a day. 

His journal on this tour, written In 
pencil at night when the impressions of 
what he had seen were still fresh, is free 
from the phrases of a guide book, and 
from any attempt at style, or "word 
painting,' ' but is full of remarkably clear 
and definite descriptions exhibiting fine 
[108] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

discrimination and quick perceptions, 
enlivened, moreover, with humorous 
incidents of the day's travel. Had he 
been working for his bread and butter 
like a commercial traveler, he could 
not have been more indefatigable in 
his pursuit of the picturesque, " in this 
country where there was every requi- 
site for a beautiful picture and a new 
one at every step." 

Naturally he was impressed with the 
contrast between these scenes and those 
he was familiar with in South America. 
He says, "Nothing I have yet seen in 
Switzerland is to be compared with the 
dangers of some of the mountains of 
Peru and Chile." Nevertheless, after 
passing through "scenes from which 
Salvator Rosa himself might have caught 
an idea," in crossing the Gemmi with 
its frightful, precipitous galleries over- 
hung with rocks, where he devoted two 
hours to making a sketch, "he felt 
[109] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

much satisfaction when emerging into 
the valley in thinking he was out of the 
reach of dangers that are after all more 
imaginary than real, something like that 
which one experiences after a good, 
hearty shock of earthquake." 

The beautiful, the picturesque, always 
appealed to him more strongly than the 
awful and sublime. 

" I have seen sufficient of the Alps to de- 
termine that the Andes are not to compare 
with them in point of beauty. I speak of 
course of such parts of the Andes as I have 
seen, having crossed them no less than five 
times in Peru and Chile. One marked and 
all important difference is that the Andes, at 
least in a great part of Chile and particularly 
in Peru, on the side of the Pacific are quite 
barren, hardly producing grass except in the 
higher parts, and no trees whatever, except 
fruit trees in the valleys. Even to their very 
base, they are nothing but rocks and sand, 
the pictures of dreariness and desolation. 

On the contrary, nothing can be more 
[no] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

beautiful than the vegetation on these moun- 
tains. Wherever there is the least soil on 
the almost perpendicular ascents there are 
cultivations, or at least bushes and clumps 
of firs ; indeed, whole groves of trees are 
sustained on the nearly perpendicular sides 
to an immense height in a manner truly 
surprising, so as constantly to attract your 
attention and call forth your admiration." 

The traveler in his absence was not 
unmindful to gratify his sisters from 
time to time with such gifts as young 
ladies would especially appreciate, nor 
did he fail to remember generously his 
sister Maria's " Poor Widows' Society." 

The alarming illness of his father 
while still suffering from a broken leg 
increased the anxiety of his mother and 
sisters for the traveler's return. Al- 
though not a murmur escaped his fa- 
ther's lips, his mother cried, "Oh, if 
Daniel were here what a support he 
would be to me." 

[in] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

His sister Maria wrote: 

" My dear brother, when shall we see you 
back again ? I begin to feel some of that 
impatience with which I waited your re- 
turn from the Pacific. I have sometimes 
thought it a little strange considering our 
long separations and the little time we have 
spent together that my attachment should be 
so strong for you. But true it is that you 
are very dear to my heart, and I look for- 
ward to your return and to your residence 
among us as one of the most pleasing inci- 
dents of my future life." 

His father wrote to Maria in June, 
1832: 

" We shall all be in readiness to receive 
your long-absent brother with open arms 
and hearts, which may Heaven grant in due 
time." 

And his brother Joshua : 

" Length of time and distance of place 
have by no means diminished the esteem 
and affection which all the members of the 
family possess for you." 

[112] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

That Mr. Coit at this time contem- 
plated returning to Italy to continue the 
study of art, appears from a letter from 
Mrs. George M. Woolsey to Mrs. Perit. 
After speaking of the pleasure she and 
Mr. Woolsey had in seeing him in Eng- 
land, she continues : 

" If my life is spared I shall hope to see 
him here again, but I have told him my 
hopes and wishes in regard to his future 
plans, and I hope he will profit by my hints. 
To see him here unaccompanied by any 
friend less dear than a sister I should regret, 
for I should then fear he would put his own 
plans into execution and return to Italy for 
the purpose of devoting himself to his fa- 
vorite pursuit. This we must endeavor to 
prevent. We must persuade him of the fact 
that he can be more usefully and more hap- 
pily engaged (even in this pursuit) in his 
own country." 

Although it might have been late in 
life for a beginner to undertake the 
study of art as a profession, there can be 

8 ["3] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

little doubt of Mr. Coit's success had 
he chosen to adopt it, for he was no 
novice. His interest in art continued 
through many years, and the skill he 
had acquired by unremitting practice 
with pencil and brush had already ad- 
vanced him beyond the rank of amateurs. 

At last, in July, 1832, the returned 
traveler had the happiness of finding 
his father in greatly improved health 
and of receiving a cordial welcome 
from an unbroken family circle. His 
winning and convincing manner in pre- 
senting business propositions to strangers 
we have already seen to be remarkable. 
Still more interesting is the firm hold 
he retained on the affection of all 
his family, notwithstanding the new 
attachments they had formed during 
his exile, which seems to prove the 
truth of the adage, " absence makes 
the heart grow fonder." 

The summer of 1 8 3 2 was the dreaded 

[in] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

cholera season in New York. As neither 
duty nor necessity compelled the broth- 
ers, Daniel and Joshua, to remain in 
the city, they spent some time under 
the elms, to the great gratification of 
their parents. Their mother wrote: 

" Our dear sons are with us, and I think 
are enjoying themselves. Daniel has had 
two or three hunting excursions, quite in 
style, and, though he complains of dearth of 
game, has given us several nice dishes of 
wood cocks and partridges. Strawberries are 
abundant and a luxury for him. Joshua fills 
up the time with books. They have now 
gone to ride." 

In November, 1833, a year after his 
return, occurred the death of his father, 
an event not wholly unexpected but 
the first break in the family circle, and 
his presence at that time was a great 
comfort to his bereaved mother. 

His sister Maria, herself happily mar- 
ried, had more than once expressed her 

["5] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

desire to see him in the enjoyment of 
equal felicity. When he was in South 
America, hearing that a friend of his 
had married a Spanish woman, she felt 
" pretty confident that he would be con- 
tent only with one of his own country- 
women. " There are allusions to " Har- 
riet," who had passed the day with her, 
and to " Harriet, the only daughter, 
a pleasant girl and quite a charming 
child." And again referring to her 
mother's wifely devotion, she says : 

" Had you seen her I think even you 
would have acknowledged that a good wife 
is a valuable acquisition. How often have I 
wished you had such a treasure ! I appre- 
ciate your domestic qualities too highly to 
feel satisfied with your leading a single life, 
and I mention the subject to you often, 
though selfishness might prompt to silence. ,, 

How far an intimacy was promoted 
by her gentle influence does not appear, 
but the autobiography informs us that 
[116] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

he " settled down as a married man " 
in September, 1834, when "Harriet 
Frances, daughter of Levi Coit, and 
granddaughter of Joseph Howland, 
both old merchants of New York/' 
became his wife. Her mother, Lydia 
Howland Coit, was his own cousin. 

The center of fashion in New York 
at that time was " above Bleecker 
Street," in the neighborhood of " the 
Parade Ground," as Washington Square 
was then called, and here the bridal pair 
made their home in Washington Place, 
near Broadway, which reached its ex- 
treme northern limit at Fourteenth 
Street, and here they were surrounded 
by a large circle of friends and cousins. 
Mr. Coit's early love of rural life and 
occupations was so far revived that after 
two years he bought an estate at New 
Rochelle, seventeen miles distant from 
the city, where he was as successful as 
of old in the cultivation of peaches and 
["7] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

pears. At New Rochelle were born 
his two elder children, — Elizabeth Bill 
and Charles Woolsey. 

At a somewhat earlier period, Octo- 
ber 25, 1833, an event occurred which 
afterwards proved to be of great impor- 
tance. It is thus described in his brother 
Joshua's " Reminiscences " : 

" He went on a western tour for the pur- 
pose of grouse shooting, a variety of game 
which, under the name of prairie chickens, 
abounded in the then unsettled prairies of 
Michigan. He fell in with a commissioner 
of the United States who was engaged in 
locating some lands for the government of- 
fices and county seats in that state, then a 
territory. As the commissioner proved to 
be a brother sportsman, they partook of the 
pursuit of grouse together. In the course 
of the trip his companion told my brother 
he could not do better than invest a few 
thousand dollars in government lands in well 
selected sites, which would at least serve to 

[us] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

defray the expenses of his excursion. My 
brother thought favorably of the suggestion. 
He proceeded, however, as far as the rapids 
of Grand River, where he found an old 
French Indian trader, Campau by name, 
who had long before settled in the wilder- 
ness, and was the only landowner of note 
living there. He took great interest in my 
brother's skill in shooting and knowledge of 
wood craft, invited him to his house, pointed 
out the advantages the place had for settle- 
ment, aided him in selecting desirable land, 
and the result was he made extensive pur- 
chases there. The place was soon made the 
county seat ; it has since become an impor- 
tant manufacturing town, and this shooting 
excursion thus led to a purchase which has 
become the main dependence of his family." 

Uninterrupted prosperity through a 
long life is the lot of very few men of 
affairs, and Mr. Coit did not escape the 
calamities which prevailed throughout 
the country in the period since known 
as the hard times of 1837. The par- 

["9] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

ticular causes that led to his misfortunes 
need not here be inquired into. A few- 
words from his autobiography tell all 
that we know : 

" Unfortunately, in a few years I lost the 
property I had acquired abroad, and was 
under long-continued embarrassment. I will 
not enlarge on so unprofitable a subject ; 
suffice it to say that I was glad to accept a 
proposition of my mother to take up my 
abode with her in the old family mansion, 
with little expectation that I should again be 
known in the haunts of business." 

The summer of 1841 found him re- 
established with his wife and children 
under his mother's roof, the home of 
his boyhood, beginning life anew at the 
age of fifty-four, impoverished indeed, 
but with undaunted spirit and courage. 
With no less zeal than he had given to 
business interests involving millions, he 
now applied himself with all his might 
to the cultivation of his gardens and 
[120] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

orchards ; and in this, as in all his affairs, 
acting on the maxim that "unceasing 
care and vigilance were the indispen- 
sable requisites of success,' ' he soon 
established a reputation in the markets 
as a most successful producer of choice 
fruits and vegetables. 

With patience and Christian fortitude 
he accepted a situation that would have 
been humiliating after his twice seven 
years of prosperity, his well-earned holi- 
day in Europe, and the auspicious begin- 
ning of his married life, had he not 
been sustained by consciousness of his 
own integrity, by his naturally hopeful 
temperament, and by domestic happi- 
ness in his old home in the town he 
loved so well. 

But on the whole, the years passed 
slowly, and his vision sought a wider 
horizon in the west where were allur- 
ing prospects of new fortunes. He 
made several excursions to the middle 

[121] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

western territories, then, only seventy 
years ago, a wilderness ; and, among 
other ventures on the prairies of Iowa, 
beyond the Mississippi River, he 
began sheep-farming, in which he 
saw great prospective profits. More 
encouraging and more substantial was 
the gradual development of his prop- 
erty at Grand Rapids, which, though 
at times a heavy burden, he was fortu- 
nately able to retain. In his quiet 
retirement under the elms he found 
abundant occupation ; he welcomed 
his friends and relatives with courtly 
hospitality, and maintained constant in- 
terest in the welfare and prosperity of 
the church in the "first parish,' ' which 
he had joined, and in its Sunday-school. 
Edmund Clarence Stedman, who 
warmly encouraged the writing of this 
memoir, shortly before his death fur- 
nished this little memory picture of 
Mr. Coit after more than sixty years : 
[122] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

" How fine to have those letters by my 
dear old Sunday School teacher, Mr. D. W. 
Coit ! I say old, but of course I must be a 
score of years the senior of that affectionately 
delightful, travelled Mentor, at the age when 
he made even Puritanism attractive to me. 
I prized, too, the visits to his house on the 
hill, where he showed me drawings — my 
first glimpses of art — and told wondrous 
tales of moneys gained in South America, 
and, necessarily brought away by stratagem. 
I must then have been about twelve or thir- 
teen, say 1845-6, and I clearly remember 
that he went to Mexico afterwards, to recruit 
his fortune, and that he of course came back 
in time with another sackful of melted silver. 
His story would make a winsome book for 
young or old." 

It is not strange that in his letters to 
his wife in these repeated western jour- 
neys he was always solicitous for her 
health and happiness and for the wel- 
fare of their children. That was to be 
expected of course, but most interesting 
and characteristic are his minute direc- 
["3] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

tions in regard to the garden and fruit 
orchard ; how the strawberry beds shall 
be treated; when certain melons shall 
be picked and brought in to ripen on 
a particular shelf in a sunny window ; 
where the ruta-bagas shall be planted; 
and the special attention that shall be 
given to a certain tree on which is a 
graft with only three pears that must 
be nearly ripe and must be carefully 
picked by hand and kept until his re- 
turn. 

These journeys to the western coun- 
try gave him the opportunity he had 
long desired of visiting his brother 
Henry at his home near Cleveland, 
Ohio. 

The contrast in the interesting ca- 
reers of the two brothers is specially 
noteworthy. 

Daniel, as has been seen, thoroughly 
trained to scrupulous exactness in vast 

[124] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

business enterprises ; bold but cautious ; 
able to direct large affairs, while atten- 
tive to details; inured to hardship on 
the land and on the sea, yet retaining 
the hand and perceptions of an artist ; 
capable of roughing it in the Andes 
with Spanish herdsmen and muleteers, 
and of meeting on even terms bankers 
and merchants of distinction, was 
equally at home in his orchard and in 
the brilliant capitals of Europe. 

Henry, amiable, affectionate, gener- 
ous, early established in domestic life 
on his father's lands in the Western 
Reserve, — the so-called " Land of Prom- 
ise/' the land of great expectations and 
of great disappointments, — widely sep- 
arated from his parents and brothers and 
sisters, and from the home of his boy- 
hood; a fast friend, a good neighbor, a 
useful citizen ; always enterprising and 
always hopeful, endured hardships and 
privations in the wilderness undismayed 

[125] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

by the inevitable reverses that are the 
fate of all pioneer settlers. 

Unlike as the brothers were in their 
environment and manner of life, they 
were alike in their devotion to those to 
whom they were specially bound by 
ties of kindred and affection, in their 
strict integrity, and in their loyalty to 
the principles of true virtue and godli- 
ness of living in which they had been 
nurtured in their childhood. 

They were alike also in their fond- 
ness for out-of-doors avocations, and in 
their gardens and fruit yards they found, 
with Lord Bacon, " the purest of human 
pleasures, and the greatest refreshment 
to the spirits of man." No new variety 
of fruit or improved method of cultiva- 
tion ever escaped their watchful eyes. 

A sister of theirs who inherited the 
same family trait had in the backyard 
of her city house a grapevine which 
she had grown from a cutting secured 

[126] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

from her next neighbor. The elder 
brother, visiting her, said : " Sister, I 
see you have a promising young grape- 
vine, but it has not been well trimmed. 
If you will allow me I will take my 
knife and cut away all the old wood, 
and the result will be more and better 
grapes/' " Certainly, brother," she said, 
" I shall be glad to have you do what 
you think best. ,, A few months later 
came the younger brother, with critical 
eye, and said : " Sister, I was sorry to 
see that your grapevine — an Isabella, I 
believe — had been neglected and needed 
trimming. I have taken the liberty of 
cutting away all the old wood, and now 
I think you will find it greatly im- 
proved." She said, "Thank you very 
much, brother." But the younger gen- 
eration never ceased to wonder where 
the grapes would come from if all the 
old wood was cut away twice in one 
year. 

[127] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

The revolving wheel of fortune, in 
January, 1848, opened a new chapter 
in the life of Mr. Coit not less inter- 
esting than those that had preceded it. 
In response to a telegraphic invitation 
from his friends and kinsmen, Howland 
& Aspinwall, he left his home at short 
notice to engage in a confidential finan- 
cial enterprise in their behalf in the city 
of Mexico, and embarked in a sailing 
vessel for Vera Cruz by way of the 
island of Jamaica. The voyage of thirty 
days was so long and tedious that, not- 
withstanding his experience on the 
ocean, he was never so miserable on 
shipboard before. Attempting to de- 
scribe the wretchedness of the situation, 
he says : " Oh, how fatiguing, how nau- 
seating, how every way unpleasant, is a 
long, hard gale at sea ! " On a Sunday, 
the worst day of all, he remained in his 
berth, and, as many a traveler has done, 
derived such comfort as he could from 

[128] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

the one hundred and seventh psalm, 
" They that go down to the sea in 
ships"; but he did not find even that 
a sovereign remedy. 

His journey over two hundred miles 
on horseback from Vera Cruz to Mexico 
was perilous on account of the lawless 
bands of guerrillas that infested the 
road ; but having provided himself 
with a suitable horse, a Mexican saddle, 
blankets, and accoutrements, he set off 
"quite a la Spagnole" "This used to 
be very pleasant," he adds, " but I assure 
you there is no longer the least romance 
about it at all." By powerful influence 
he was enabled to attach himself to a 
government train of about eighty four- 
horse army wagons carrying supplies to 
the capital under an escort of two hun- 
dred soldiers. The annoyances and per- 
plexities, the nameless horrors he now 
experienced, not only in the inevitable 
discomforts of the road, but in the com- 
9 [129] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

pany of dissolute and blasphemous troops 
and wagoners from whom escape was 
impossible, made his expedition over 
the South American Cordilleras seem in 
comparison like a pleasure trip. 

The fatiguing journey was interrupted 
by a short stay at Jalapa, where it was 
once more his good fortune to renew 
his acquaintance with one of his former 
friends in Lima, a Mr. Kennedy, by 
whom he was hospitably entertained. 

The city of Mexico at the time of 
his arrival was occupied by the victori- 
ous army of the United States under 
General Winfield Scott. An armistice 
had been concluded, and as the troops 
were comparatively idle pending the 
signing of the treaty of peace, disorder 
and vice were prevalent in the city to a 
degree that exceeded anything that he 
had ever seen either in South America 
or in Europe. 

1*3°'] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

Not long after his arrival he witnessed 
the evacuation of Mexico by General 
Scott's army with imposing ceremonies, 
exchange of salutes, and all the honors 
of war. He said he was never so home- 
sick in his life and wished he could go 
home also. 

" I would gladly turn my face tomorrow 
towards old, unpretending Norwich rather 
than to the finest city the world has to boast 
of, not excepting this far famed city of the 
Montezumas. ... I find a vast difference 
in my feelings and views now from what ex- 
isted in my former travels ; there was a 
compensation then, in being absent from 
one's country and family, but nothing what- 
ever abroad can now make any tolerable 
amends for absence from wife, family and 
home, though my duty regarding pecuniary 
considerations renders it necessary for me to 
be yet some time absent. . . . 

" Taking into view all the encomiums I 
had heard of this city I expected to find 
it very superior to Lima ; it is larger and 
somewhat better built ; there are more large 

[131] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

and showy streets and houses, but neither 
the climate nor the location are, in my view, 
equal to those of Lima, and the morals and 
general character of the people are, I think, 
decidedly worse." 

His financial and commercial business 
in Mexico consisted in negotiating drafts 
and making remittances, and was con- 
ducted through the firm of William 
Drusina & Co. in whose house he had 
comfortable lodgings and through whom 
he was introduced to the most agreeable 
society, both of Mexicans and foreign- 
ers, that the city afforded. 

In Mexico, his knowledge of the 
Spanish language, which had grown 
rusty, came back to him, and, much 
to his advantage, he could soon "speak 
it famously/' 

In October, 1848, having "still two 
long months, long in prospective, to 
look forward to," he quoted Young's 
"Night Thoughts" on the slow ap- 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

proach of "Time, creeping decrepit 
with his age," and anticipated his 
speedy return home on "broad pin- 
ions swifter than the wind." He goes 
on to say: 

cc To tell you the truth, however, my time 
does not pass either unprofitably or disagree- 
ably, and, with the exception of separation 
from you, which is, to be sure, a sad draw- 
back, I may say, pleasantly. I have the 
satisfaction of reflecting that I am accomplish- 
ing something substantial for your benefit at 
very little cost of labor, while my leisure 
moments are usefully occupied with the 
pencil in illustrating this celebrated city and 
its neighborhood in a manner which, so far 
as I know, has not been before attempted, 
and which may result in considerable 
pecuniary advantage." 

The sketches that he made at this 
time, more than thirty in number, are 
of peculiar value and interest, not only 
as faithful representations of the scenes 
that were before him, but as examples 
[*33] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

of the artistic perception which enabled 
him to select for his pencil, almost in- 
stinctively, the best points of view for 
picturesque effects whether of buildings 
or of landscapes. He had indeed rare 
skill, such as few amateurs possess, in 
an art which, since the advent of pho- 
tographic cameras, is becoming one of 
the lost arts. 

Continuing to speak of his sketches, 
shortly before leaving Mexico he 
wrote : 

" I get a drive occasionally to one or other 
of the villages in this neighborhood. They 
originated in the time of the Spaniards and 
great wealth was bestowed on large churches 
and convents with extensive gardens and 
orchards. The houses are built of corre- 
sponding size and architecture, enclosing one 
or more courts filled with orange, lemon, and 
other ornamental trees and shrubbery and 
fountains in the center. One of my last 
sketches was of a court of this kind. It is 
one of the smallest but every foot of it is 

[134] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

occupied with objects of interest, and it is a 
perfect little gem of itself. It has been a 
laborious thing to sketch and much more to 
fill up afterwards with so much detail, but 
as it is different from anything we have, 
I think it will please, and pay for the 
trouble. . . . 

" I shall probably send home my sketches 
ere I leave for the west coast with some curi- 
osities and paintings I have succeeded in 
obtaining, the most curious of which are a 
set of rich tapestry hangings, originally sent 
by the King of Spain to a rich Mexican as a 
return for a large amount of bars of silver 
he had sent the King. The subjects are 
very humorous, representing the most amus- 
ing passages in the life of Don Quixote. . . . 

There are seven of these hangings, quite 
large ; the largest, some eighteen feet long, 
by nine or ten feet in height. . . . They 
are in the worst possible condition to be seen, 
and those who know nothing about them, 
and how far they are capable with proper 
treatment of being restored, would, I well 
know be much inclined to turn up their 
noses and pronounce them rubbish. They 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

are also broken in many places, and are more 
or less faded ; but all this is capable of being 
remedied to a considerable degree. . . . They 
came into my possession in a curious way, 
as you shall hear some day. . . . The paint- 
ings, also, are in a very bad state, though 
capable of restoration. ,, 

Twenty-five years later, when he was 
in his eighty-eighth year, he told the 
story in a letter to his cousin, Mrs. 
George C. Ripley of Minneapolis, 
which, happily, has been preserved to 
this day. 

Norwich, May 13, 1875. 
My dear Cousin, — I acknowledge with 
pleasure your note of Saturday last in which 
you ask for some " historical points " in 
regard to the tapestries which I possess. . . . 
I have no doubt a very pretty story might 
be constructed out of their lives, and that, 
without infringing upon strict truthfulness. 
. . . Their checkered history involves in 
its course stranger vicissitudes than ever 
happened to their like before. Fancy them 
in all their early freshness and beauty, adorn- 

[136] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

ing the walls of the palace at Madrid, or 
perhaps the Escurial, throwing into shadow 
for the moment the wonderful productions 
of Murillo and others of the most celebrated 
masters of art. ... How long they main- 
tained this high elevation we cannot tell ; it 
might have been for a hundred years, or it 
might have been not half that period, but 
certain it is, the day of their decadence had 
at length arrived, and now comes in the his- 
tory of my acquaintance with them and 
finally my possession of them. 

You have doubtless heard of a visit I 
made to the city of Mexico some twenty-five 
years ago. Now it has always been my cus- 
tom wherever I have been in the Spanish 
cities of America, to be looking about if by 
any chance I might stumble upon an original 
picture by one of the old masters which were 
known to have been formerly sent from Spain 
for the use of the churches. It so happened 
that in one of these searches I entered into a 
painter's shop, a large lofty apartment, where 
to my great surprise I found the rough walls 
adorned with these rare and beautiful crea- 
tions of art. . . . Of course I enquired what 

[ l 3l] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

strange circumstance had brought them into 
this queer place, when the following history 
was given me. 

Some rich person (I think the head of a 
noble family) had rendered important services 
to the King of Spain, and these tapestries 
were sent as a testimonial of his appreciation 
of those services. This rich man died, and 
so little importance was attached to the 
tapestries, that by some strange freak they 
fell into the hands of the Padre, or priest of 
the family, and by him they were transferred 
to my friend the painter. 

I had some other transactions with him, 
and frequently visited the place for my grati- 
fication, never dreaming of becoming the 
purchaser of articles so valuable (I had been 
told a valuation of $7000 had been put upon 
them), when one day the painter dropped in 
upon me to ask a favor : he was much pressed 
for a little ready cash, and if I would accom- 
modate him he would deposit in my hands 
as security a couple of these tapestries. Of 
course I did so, and it was not many days 
before the request was repeated with the 
same result, and now it flashed upon my 

[138] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

mind that they would eventually be mine, 
and so it was. A proposition soon came to 
me which I gladly embraced, and thus you 
have the history of the tapestries so far as I 
know. 

Pray excuse the delay in replying to your 
request, and believe me, 

Affectionately yours, 

D. W. Coit. 

If this is partly conjecture, it is nev- 
ertheless a very pretty story as it stands, 
and may it not be asserted with confi- 
dence that invention is the mother of 
history ? 

At the close of the year 1848, when 
his engagement with Howland & As- 
pinwall was about to expire, and he was 
looking homeward with longing eyes, 
he, and indeed the whole world, was 
astounded with reports that seemed 
almost chimerical of the discovery of 
gold in California. After vain endeav- 
1*39] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

ors to persuade his friends in New York 
to undertake a new enterprise with him 
in California, he closed with a proposal 
made by Mr. Drusina, with whom he 
was then on terms of friendly intimacy, 
to proceed overland to the Pacific coast 
and thence by steamer to San Francisco 
with a view of purchasing gold dust 
which the miners would willingly ex- 
change at less than its value for silver 
coin that was readily convertible into 
the necessaries of life. 

In this business he and Mr. Drusina 
were representatives of the Rothschilds, 
the eminent European bankers, and as 
such were supplied with ample capital 
and credit. Mr. Coit was to receive a 
liberal commission on all purchases and 
shipments, and the prospect thus pre- 
sented to him of realizing a comfortable 
fortune was so flattering that he had no 
alternative but to accept it. His disap- 
pointment was great, however, that his 
[140] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

friends in New York would not engage 
with him in this business, which, he 
believed, would be profitable, and he 
thus wrote to his wife : 

" When I received my discouraging letters 
from the house, all my bright plans and pros- 
pects appeared for the moment blasted, and 
I had, I assure you, the most gloomy day I 
have experienced since I have been in Mexico; 
but what short sighted beings we are ! We 
never can see much beyond the length of 
our noses, and often when appearances are 
most unfavorable they are working for our 
ultimate good. I passed as I have said a 
very dull day, but called on Mr. Drusina the 
following morning and told him the course 
the business had taken. Perhaps he saw 
that I looked more sober than usual, for he 
said, c you know I am very busy, and until I 
get off my packet letters I can say nothing, 
but just write to Mrs. Coit in general terms, 
that you will still be able to carry out your 
views with no loss to your prospects !' Was 
not this noble, and is there not besides, this 
pleasant reflection in it, aside from any 

[Hi] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

pecuniary consideration, that the moment 
almost that I leave my humble retirement, 
and, without any means, am thrown among 
strangers, I am able to form friendships and 
inspire confidence such as the foregoing indi- 
cates ? Still, my dear wife, I have learned to 
look with distrust on all brilliant prospects, 
and, even now, in this matter which puts on 
so bright an appearance, I may from some 
unexpected cause meet disappointment ; but 
as it appears clearly the leading of a kind 
providence so it should be received and acted 
upon ; yet if a change comes over my pros- 
pects I hope you will not find me downcast 
and disheartened." 

Early in March, 1849, after some 
delay, but with short notice at the last, 
he left Mexico with a party of eighteen 
besides muleteers, all mounted and fully 
armed, for the ride of five hundred miles 
to San Bias on the western coast. The 
journey was not without inconveniences, 
such as sleeping on the ground in the 
open air, and especially from the fa- 

[142]' 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

tigue of being in the saddle at midday 
under a blazing sun ; but he was not a 
novice and could not see but he bore 
fatigue as well as the others, though he 
had never realized his age so much as 
on this occasion when he was treated 
with all the consideration and respect 
he could desire as the father of the party. 
He did not lose the opportunity to record 
with his pencil some of the interesting 
objects on the route. 

Arriving in San Francisco, the new 
Eldorado, by steamer after a voyage of 
seven days, repeating his former expe- 
riences, Mr. Coit again found himself 
in a novel environment, among strangers, 
far from home, in perilous times, and 
was enrolled as one of the modern Ar- 
gonauts and an " original forty-niner/' 
Information received in Mexico had 
prepared him to find that the people 
of the United States were " beside them- 
selves on this California gold business/' 

[143] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

Multitudes, deluded by the vain hope of 
growing rich in a day, poured into Cal- 
ifornia by the overland route, by the 
isthmus, or by the long voyage round 
Cape Horn. All means of transporta- 
tion for those coming or returning were 
overcrowded; the prices of all com- 
modities were inordinately high ; and 
thousands of disappointed adventurers, 
stricken with disease, and left penniless, 
without shelter, food, or clothing, were 
unable to return to their homes. 

There was, of course, another side to 
this picture of disappointment and suf- 
fering among the pioneer gold hunters, 
and Mr. Coit names as examples, among 
many successful ones, some of his own 
acquaintances who by good luck in the 
" diggings' ' had drawn prizes in the 
lottery, or by wise foresight in buying 
land and building houses, had in a short 
time acquired fortunes that were re- 
garded as very large; yet it remained 
[144] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

true that in the scheme of the California 
lottery there were a few brilliant prizes, 
and many smaller ones, but that the 
greater number were blanks. 

Mr. Coit's habits of prudence, tem- 
perance, and self-control, strengthened 
by his years, his experience in time of 
danger and disturbance, and by his sense 
of moral and religious obligation, kept 
him clear from the manifold misfor- 
tunes and pitfalls that entrapped and 
ruined multitudes of men, both the 
young and the old. 

Among those who had been fortu- 
nate in the gold fields, or lucky in 
speculation or gambling, vice and dis- 
sipation of all kinds were prevalent. 
In the absence of an efficient govern- 
ment and adequate police protection, 
desperadoes and lewd fellows of the 
baser sort, fearing not God and regard- 
ing not man, not only menaced — they 
[i45] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

outraged the property, the persons, and 
the lives of peaceable citizens. 

In the summer of 1849 lawlessness 
and open violence by bands of ruffians, 
calling themselves " hounds' ' or " reg- 
ulators/ ' had increased to such an extent 
that a reign of terror prevailed. As the 
police were incompetent to quell the 
disturbance the respectable citizens, al- 
most to a man, organized themselves as 
a committee of safety for self-defense, 
patroled the streets day and night with 
armed men, hunted down and arrested 
the marauders, established a criminal 
court with a judge and jury, and exe- 
cuted summary justice until safety and 
order could be restored. These meas- 
ures for self-protection, though without 
the sanction of the law, commended 
themselves to right-minded men as en- 
tirely justifiable under the then existing 
circumstances, and were vindicated by 
the results. 

[146] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

Mr. Coit yielded to no temptation to 
engage in speculations, but confined 
himself strictly to his own business, 
which, while it imposed grave respon- 
sibilities, left him leisure to increase the 
number of his sketches that are now 
valuable as historical records of the early 
days of San Francisco. He lived a re- 
tired life, and as economically as was 
possible when the prices for even small 
articles in daily use were enormous. 
Milk, for example, was seventy-five 
cents a quart ; washing, six dollars a 
dozen ; common laborers demanded six 
dollars a day ; a woman, " to oblige/' 
charged twenty-five cents a yard for 
running up seams of cotton cloth, but 
could afford to do no more at the 
price ! Clothing, food, and rent were 
high in proportion. 

The town was a great tinder-box, 
with no protection whatever against 
fire, so that Mr. Coit was in constant 

[147] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

dread of a general conflagration, which 
after a few months came, and, thrice 
repeated, brought ruin to hundreds of 
merchants. 

Altogether, the lot of a " forty-niner/ ' 
especially if he desired to do his business 
in peace and quietness, was not a happy 
one. There was no congenial society. 
Tidings from home were infrequent, 
and the mails from the Atlantic coast, 
coming but once a month, were long 
on the route. On August 21 Mr. Coit 
reported the mail as arrived, and " after 
waiting two days and making sundry 
useless efforts to get through the throng 
pressing about the post-office for letters, 
I have at last succeeded in getting yours 
of June 25, with the best of news, that 
you are all well!" Almost sixty days 
from Norwich ! 

At about the same time he wrote to 
Mr. Gilman : 

[148] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

cc I had the pleasure to receive per last 
steamer your favor of June 28, enclosing a 
most unexpected letter from my sister Kings- 
ley, and no less gratifying than unexpected, 
informing me of the improved state of her 
health, and that Mr. Kingsley and the chil- 
dren were in the enjoyment of that greatest 
of blessings. I have replied to her, and as 
it occurs to me that sister Eliza and the girls 
may be interested in a brief account of the 
strange and unexampled state of things here 
I leave the letter open for their perusal. . . . 
Tell them that my thoughts and affections 
turn more than ever towards home, and that 
I trust, with the blessing of a kind and 
watchful providence we may meet again ere 
long, bound to one another by stronger ties 
than ever." 

Almost all of his letters conveyed 
salutations and greetings to his friends 
and kinsmen, mentioning them by 
name, as in the following: 

" Remember me to neighbor Thomas ; 
tell him to hold on a little longer and he will 

[149] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

see me again at my old stand in the garden 
and fruit yard, and further that I shall have 
a good long yarn to spin for him. Remem- 
ber me also to George and Hannah Ripley, 
and tell George I shall be right glad to take 
him by the hand again one of these days, 
not very remote, I trust. My love to my 
dear Aunt Lathrop, also to dear cousin Mary 
Ann Woodhull and Elizabeth/* 

His own concerns prospered, and in 
May, 1850, he wrote to his wife as 
follows : 

" It is gratifying to perceive that the 
prompt manner in which the business en- 
trusted to me has been conducted is now 
somewhat more advantageous than in the 
early days of my being here. It is further 
gratifying to reflect that in the rather large 
transactions for my Mexican friends the past 
year, not only has no fault or objection been 
made, but the most entire satisfaction ex- 
pressed ; neither has the smallest error oc- 
curred in my accounts rendered. 

" Indeed, I should have filled the station 
[150] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

of principal for so long a mercantile life to 
little purpose were I now unable to perform 
the duties of an agent with tact and efficiency. 
I nust tell you that I now consider it exceed- 
ingly fortunate that my friends in New York 
did not accept the proposition I made to 
them. It would have involved me in great 
responsibilities, given me hard labor with 
many annoyances, and the uncertainty of 
giving satisfaction. 

"As it is, I am entirely my own master, 
which, with one of my age and habits, is 
something, at least ; and then I have an ex- 
ceedingly easy position as to labor, with no 
responsibilities that I am unequal to or afraid 
to grapple with ; while in a pecuniary point 
of view I certainly have lost nothing." 

The letters that he received at this 
time from his friends in Mexico were 
of unusual interest, covering, as he 
wrote, bills of lading of $70,000 in 
gold and silver coin to his address, 
making him the largest consignee on the 
steamer's manifest. He goes on to say : 

[151] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

" What a strange, eventful life this of mine 
has been ! Do you not sometimes think so, 
dearest ? And the last chapter in it is the 
most strange of all ! But little more than 
two years ago, long retired from all inter- 
course with men of business, and lost sight 
of, or, if thought of, perhaps considered in- 
competent, or already too old for an active 
life ; without credit or property, or compara- 
tively none ; submitting rather from necessity 
than choice to much irksome toil and labor 
to which I was unaccustomed, and now how 
changed ! Enjoying the unlimited confidence 
of mercantile houses of very high standing in 
the world whose acquaintance is quite recent 
and accidental, among others the Rothschilds; 
with the control of large specie funds, and 
credits on different parts of the world ; hand- 
ling gold coin and gold dust with as much 
sangfroid as I did my garden seeds a little 
time ago ! I say, are not these rapid changes 
and contrasts truly astonishing ? How won- 
derfully has an ever presiding and gracious 
providence watched over me and directed all 
my footsteps for good ! " 

[152] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

In the first year of his residence in 
San Francisco the church buildings 
were of the most primitive construc- 
tion, scarcely more than rough sheds ; 
but he continued his habit of regular 
attendance on public worship, giving 
the preference from associations at 
home to the Congregational church, 
but finding on the whole greater satis- 
faction in the Episcopal church, where 
he listened to — 

" capital sermons from the Reverend Flavel 
S. Mines, whom I have been much in the 
habit of going to hear of late. The fact is, 
I feel a little more at liberty to do so here 
than I should at home, and I go where I 
can hear the best preaching, and be most 
edified and instructed. He is one of the 
most uniformly impressive and orthodox 
preachers, as an Episcopalian, I have ever 
heard." 

In January, 1851, he wrote: 
" My health here has been uniformly 
good. I don't know how frequently it has 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

been remarked within the last six months, 
c Why, how well you are looking ! ' This, 
it will be observed, is to a person on the 
wrong side of sixty." 

His pleasant intercourse in Liverpool 
with his relations, Mr. and Mrs. George 
M. Woolsey, has already been referred 
to. In September, 1851, he wrote to 
his wife : 

" So your uncle Woolsey has been taken 
from us. I saw it was to be so, and your 
letter did not greatly surprise me, though it 
makes me sad to think that I shall no more 
see him and enjoy his refined society and 
gentlemanly hospitality, which very few in- 
deed have the knowledge and the tact, and 
at the same time the means, to make so de- 
lightfully agreeable, as he had, though the 
mantle of the father seems to have fallen 
on the son." 

It was not to be expected that the 
business of buying gold dust could long 
continue to be profitable. As more 

[154] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

coined money came into circulation 
prices inevitably equalized themselves ; 
and such stories as that of Indians giving 
for Spanish silver dollars their weight 
in gold dust (sixteen to one), or even 
of gold dust being sold for eight silver 
dollars an ounce troy, came to be re- 
garded as fabulous. 

By this time Mr. Coit had acquired 
sufficient capital to enable him to en- 
gage for his own account in business, 
the details of which are not disclosed 
in his letters, for long experience had 
taught him the wisdom of keeping his 
own counsel in several different lan- 
guages. Even to his wife, under in- 
junctions of secrecy, he did not reveal 
all that he was doing. But there is no 
doubt that he made considerable invest- 
ments in buildings and land. In March, 
1 85 1, he wrote: 

" I am now daily looking for the arrival 
of certain iron ware houses which were or- 

[iSS] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

dered from England more than a year ago. 
They were planned by me for certain friends 
of mine who propose to erect them as soon 
as they arrive. They are very large, entirely 
of iron, and, of course, fire proof, and when 
put up will be the most extensive and com- 
modious buildings for storage that exist here. 
It is this business that is keeping me here, 
and until it is finally disposed of, I mean 
turned over to other parties, I cannot leave." 

In these buildings, which arrived and 
were erected in the ensuing summer, 
and in the lands and wharves connected 
with them, Mr. Coit had a quarter 
interest. As they were immediately 
rented at the rate of $96,000 per an- 
num, at which rate they would pay for 
themselves in a short time, the invest- 
ment promised to be highly profitable. 
Although they were believed to be fire- 
proof, care was taken to erect the struc- 
tures beyond the line of exposure from 
such great conflagrations as had already 
visited San Francisco. But in avoiding 

[156] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

one danger another was incurred, for 
the sand-bluffs on which they were 
built, like the sand in the parable, were 
an unstable foundation, and when the 
rain descended and the floods came, and 
the winds blew and beat upon them, 
they fell, and great was the fall thereof. 
Mr. Coit suffered some loss and was 
disappointed in his expectations, and 
being satisfied with what he had gained 
from other sources, did not care to re- 
main to repeat the experiment. He 
therefore closed his interests in Cali- 
fornia, and to the great joy of his wife, 
his children, and his friends, after an 
absence of more than four years, re- 
turned to his home in Norwich in the 
summer of 1852. 

The following letter to his wife closes 
the story of his life in California : 

San Francisco, Sept. 13, 1851. 
" Libby's nice little note [his daughter, 
Elizabeth, aged fourteen years] was very 

[157] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

gratifying, though I must tell her I don't 
quite approve of writing letters that have so 
many miles to go on note-paper. A good 
honest sheet of letter paper would be more 
to the purpose. By the by, her hand writing 
is forming very prettily indeed. I have seen 
nothing like this before. 

I hope she had a nice visit in New Lon- 
don. I remember perfectly the first visit I 
made there when very much younger than 
she is, with my father and mother in the 
chaise with the little bobtail mare, when it 
took half a day to drive there over a hilly 
road. 

I am glad you speak so highly of our New 
London cousins [the families of Robert 
Coit, and Mrs. Nancy Coit Learned], and 
that you are disposed to keep alive your 
intercourse by frequent interchange of 
visits." 

That Mr. Coit was gratified to hear 
twenty years after his return that his 
early sketches were still appreciated in 
San Francisco appears by the following 
letter to his sister : 

[158] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

" I don't know whether you are aware 
that when Daniel Gilman left here to go to 
San Francisco I put into his hands a number 
of pencil drawings of that city and its sur- 
roundings which I had taken with some 
degree of care when I was there, and of 
course in its very early history. Well, I 
have recently received from Daniel a most 
enthusiastic account of the reception of these 
drawings. They were admitted on all hands, 
by those most capable of judging, as being 
perfectly true and withall valuable ; nothing 
short of his letter will give you any proper 
idea of the estimation in which they were 
held ; I sent the letter to Harriet, but I can 
give you, till you have an opportunity of 
seeing that, The San Francisco Bulletin^ 
which has an article sufficiently minute and 
commendatory of them/' 



The reader of these pages is now fa- 
miliar with " some of the incidents of 
an eventful life," not the least remark- 
able of which was Mr. Coit's experience 
in Mexico and California. Few men 

[159] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

past the age of sixty make a hazard 
of new fortunes in a strange country 
as successfully as he did. Fewer still, 
after the vicissitudes of a strenuous life, 
are permitted for nearly a quarter of a 
century to " rest and stand in their lot 
to the end of their days." 

In the chances and changes of his 
business career, and as a great traveler, 
he had suffered many things on the land 
and on the deep. He had seen the most 
sublime scenery of Switzerland and 
South America, and the masterpieces 
of art in the galleries of Europe. He 
had lived for years amid scenes of polit- 
ical turmoil and violence and of disas- 
trous earthquakes and conflagrations. 
Foreign travel had no longer any attrac- 
tions for him, and having reached the 
haven to which he had long looked 
forward, he was contented at last in the 
halcyon days of peace and tranquillity 
to say, as his father had said forty years 
[160] 



DANIEL WADS WORTH CO IT 

before, " Norwich remains a more suit- 
able residence for the old than for the 
young whose enjoyment is in action, 
but at my time of life quiet and ease 
constitute the principal part of my 
enjoyment." 

But in his retirement he was by no 
means idle or inactive. On the con- 
trary, having increased means, he engaged 
with enthusiasm in the improvement of 
the family mansion, its gardens and its 
meadows, and in the erection of glass 
houses for fruits and flowers. In these 
houses he might be found in winter 
regulating their temperature, and ex- 
posure to sun and light; and when he 
was well advanced in years he was a 
familiar figure on a summer day super- 
intending his garden work, sheltered by 
a broad-brimmed Panama hat that he 
had brought from Mexico, or delving 
like banished Adam in the soil with his 
[161] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

own hands. Coming into the house for 
a brief rest he responded quickly to 
slight refreshment, and then, after re- 
turning to his occupation, he would 
reappear, immaculate, at dinner time, 
prepared for its full enjoyment. 

He paid liberal wages and expected 
faithful service, but for a lazy man or a 
shirk he had no use. Going to his gar- 
den one morning he found a man whom 
he hired by the day comfortably resting 
under a convenient tree. As Mr. Coit 
approached hastily and with some in- 
dignation, the man said, " I saw you 
coming, sir, but I did not go to work ; 
it is a very hot day, and I was tired." 
Said Mr. Coit, in telling this story, "I 
respected that man. Had he picked up 
his spade and gone to work my feelings 
would have been very different ! " This 
fairly illustrates Mr. Coit's disposition. 
He knew his rights and could maintain 
them; but he could make allowances 

[162] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

for human weakness, and was charitable 
and lenient when a failure or an error 
was acknowledged. 

He cultivated choice fruits for pleas- 
ure rather than for profit, and used to 
say that he should be quite satisfied if 
cash returns equaled the amount of his 
coal bills. It is quite safe to believe 
that they never did, but in such pursuits 
he found abundant and agreeable occu- 
pation. He tested and tasted different 
varieties of peaches and pears and grapes 
with as much discrimination as a con- 
noisseur might bestow on rare old wines, 
and it is needless to say that his table was 
abundantly supplied with the choicest 
productions of his orchard and hot- 
houses. He desired to have his guests par- 
ticipate in his enjoyment of them, and 
if the uneducated palates of his younger 
friends made them wish for one whole 
pear that they knew by sight and by name 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

rather than samples of a dozen that they 
knew not of, they could not complain 
of a lack of generous hospitality. 

Another source of unceasing pleas- 
ure to the end of his days was in the 
sketches and drawings he had made in 
South America, Europe, Mexico, and 
California. When house-bound or shut 
in, the time passed quickly while he 
was arranging and finishing them, and 
using them as illustrations he became 
eloquent in describing the places and 
scenes he had visited. 

The paintings, also, that he had 
brought from foreign lands and that 
adorned his walls gave him continual 
enjoyment. They could be fully ap- 
preciated by those only who, like him- 
self, had carefully studied the works of 
the old masters, but he watched with 
keen interest their renovation under the 
hands of an artist skilled in such work, 

[i6 4 ] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

— an eccentric Dutchman, — who spent 
two summers under his roof for that 
purpose, and was not less enthusiastic 
than Mr. Coit in admiration of them. 

In 1848, while he was in Mexico, 
he had heard with sorrow from his wife 
of the death of their little daughter, 
whom he had left when she was but a 
few months old; and again, after four- 
teen years they were deeply grieved by 
the death of their daughter Elizabeth, 
the wife of the Reverend H. C. Haydn. 
After a year of married life she passed 
away, leaving an infant daughter who 
bears her name and was ever regarded 
with twofold affection by her devoted 
grandparents. 

Yet again, three years later, in 1865, 
his son Daniel became the victim of 
disease contracted in the service of the 
Sanitary Commission in the War for the 
Union. 

[165] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

On a severely cold night early in 
1865 Mr. Coit and his family were 
aroused by fire in their dwelling. While 
only half clad and almost suffocated with 
smoke, notwithstanding his nearly four- 
score years, he fought the flames with 
the good judgment and intrepidity of a 
veteran fireman. 

Among the burned contents of the 
house was the "Panama hat" that we 
have already seen in the garden. Mr. 
Coit prized it as the gift of a friend, and 
although the old Mutual Assurance So- 
ciety did not pay for sentiment it could 
not deny that its remarkably fine text- 
ure gave it the unusual value, if tradi- 
tion may be believed, of one hundred 
dollars. 

Greatly to the gratification of Mr. 
Coit and his wife, his sister Eliza (Mrs. 
Gilman) and her daughters coming to 
Norwich from New York in 1864 made 

[166] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

their home near his residence, and af- 
fectionate, intimate intercourse between 
the families enhanced the happiness of 
both households. 

Although Mr. Coit took no active 
part in politics, and never held political 
office, he was always an interested ob- 
server of affairs of the town and the 
nation, and especially of the course of 
events before and during the War for 
the Union in which his two sons, grad- 
uates of Yale College, served their coun- 
try with honor, — Charles Woolsey, the 
elder, in the Christian Commission, 
and Daniel Lathrop, in the Sanitary 
Commission. 

Mr. Coit's charities were free from 
ostentation, yet he hesitated not to give 
his name and influence to promote a 
good cause; as in 1875, when he wrote 
and signed with his own hand a sub- 
scription paper in behalf of an unfortu- 
nate neighbor who was in danger of 

[167] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

losing all he had by the foreclosure of a 
mortgage. He was a regular attendant 
upon public worship, a liberal supporter 
of the church of which he was a mem- 
ber, a loyal friend of its ministers, and 
by his quiet influence encouraged every 
effort for the repression of wickedness 
and vice and the maintenance of true 
religion and virtue. 

He never spoke publicly of his per- 
sonal religious convictions, and seldom, 
if ever, so far as is known, in private, 
but he was a truly devout man, scru- 
pulously conscientious in the discharge 
of his duty in all the relations of life. 
In his later years he was accustomed to 
read the scriptures and prayers at family 
worship. On one occasion, before be- 
ginning his devotions, he assured his 
family of his sincere affection, which, 
indeed, they never had reason to doubt, 
and with considerable emotion expressed 
[168] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

his sorrow for his occasional impatience 
and sharp criticism of small, juvenile 
improprieties which naturally were an- 
noying to one who was by many years 
the senior of his children. The inci- 
dent revealed his heart, and, as one who 
was present testifies, was truly affecting. 
Love for them made him solicitous that 
their lives and manners should be in 
accordance with the high ideals by 
which he had long governed his own 
life. Not every man would have yielded 
so far to the impulses of a warm heart. 

If he was punctiliously exact in his 
dealings with others, he demanded from 
them no more than he rendered himself, 
and so far from being censorious or quick 
to take offense he was ready to attribute 
any lack of courtesy or propriety to ig- 
norance or oversight. 

Few, if any, are now living on earth 
who remember hearing Mr. Coit say 

[i6 9 ] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

much about the " incidents of his event- 
ful life." Although he was always kind 
and friendly with the younger genera- 
tion, by reason of his age he seemed to 
them very superior and remote, — far 
more interested in the present than in 
the past; in his pears and peaches than 
in his adventures in the Alps and the 
Andes. Sometimes, however, though 
not very often, when he was found with 
his portfolio open, taking one of his 
drawings as a text he grew eloquent in 
discoursing on the scene; and no one 
who ever heard him tell of the wonder- 
ful sagacity of his favorite pointer dog, 
" Don," could forget the vivacity with 
which he told the story. 

His eldest niece, Elizabeth Gilman 
(Mrs. Thompson), who had pleasant 
recollections of him, wrote from Berlin 
in 1877 as follows: 

" Probably no one remembers more — I 
mean among the nephews and nieces — than 
[170] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

I, of our dear uncle Daniel, of his delicate 
tastes, his perceptions of everything beautiful, 
his kindness and generosity to all around, 
and, in later years, in his quiet retired life 
there was a peculiar charm in his society. 
My husband used greatly to enjoy his even- 
ing visits on the doorsteps under the big 
trees in conversation upon old times and the 
present with one who had been such a careful 
observer through a long life." 

Another quotation from his brother's 
"Reminiscences" is interesting: 

" One point I cannot omit to allude to. 
I refer to his uncommon facility, clearness 
and vivacity in narration, whether orally or 
in his letters ; some of which I hope his son 
Charles may be able to get together in a form 
that may be permanent. Not inclined to be 
garrulous, and never boastful or egotistical, 
it was not difficult, in the family circle, to 
direct his attention to some of the many 
scenes of life and adventure through which 
he had passed. 

" His observation was discriminating and 
accurate, his memory retentive and his power 

[171] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

of description lively and picturesque. He 
kindled with warmth and enthusiasm in 
recalling the scenes and adventures of former 
days and of remote countries. Whether of 
shooting in the stubble fields of New Jersey, 
and in the prairies of the West, — whether 
in the picture galleries and among the artists 
of Europe, — whether in his toilsome travels 
over the Pampas and across the Andes of 
South America, — whether of perils among 
the giddy passes of the Cordilleras and 
among the wild tribes now occupying the 
ruined cities of the Incas, — whether of 
escapes from the earthquakes he encountered 
during his long residence in the volcanic 
regions of Peru, and from mutinous crews 
on board the treasure ships of which he had 
charge, — whether among the stirring events 
in our conquest and occupation of Mexico, 
and with the adventurers and desperadoes 
among the early settlers and gold hunters of 
California, — or whether amid the tranquil 
and domestic occupations of his later years, 
literally under his own vine and his own 
fig-trees — few have had so varied and so 
striking experiences to relate, and very few 

[172] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

have such a gift of awakening the interest 
and carrying with them their listeners in the 
narration of their adventures." 

Allusion has been made already to 
the benign influence of his parents be- 
ginning in his childhood and continuing 
through his life. He himself was con- 
scious of it, for in writing to his grand- 
daughter in his eighty-sixth year he 
said: 

" If I myself have any special regard for 
truth I must in great means attribute it to 
my father and mother who, equally, took 
pains to inculcate it on their children as the 
one thing needful in their intercourse with 
the world." 

In December, 1871, Mr. Coit wrote 
to his sister : 

" I am quite surprised myself by my out 
door performances to-day, in going out into 
the woods up back of the Winship house, to 
direct the men in collecting leaves and cedar 
boughs for our borders, etc. Is it not a 

[173] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

blessing, my dear sister, this sound health 
and activity, and real enjoyment of life at 
my time of life. The exemption from all 
pecuniary care in old age is certainly not a 
small blessing of itself, and which I feel the 
more from contrast. True it came late in 
my case, but none the less on that account 
should be the thanksgiving and gratitude 
for it." 

One more extract from a letter to his 
son, bearing date November 28, 1871, 
fitly closes this chapter of his life : 

" This week is eventful in my own case. 
The twenty-ninth inst. will commemorate the 
completion of the eighty-fourth year since I 
first breathed the breath of life, in the house 
and probably in the very room where I write 
this. How strange, how passing strange, has 
the course of this long life been, how wonder- 
fully I have been protected and guided in 
those strange wanderings, from dangers seen 
and unseen, through adversity and prosperity, 
thro* sickness and thro* health, and now at 
the end to have been brought out into a 
smooth place, the very spot of all others I 

[174] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

would have chosen, in the enjoyment of 
health and the blessings of life to a degree 
allotted to but few of the sons of men: is 
not here cause for gratitude ? 

"I regret that your mother's condition 
prevents our drawing a circle of friends 
around us on Thanksgiving alike to honor 
the day, and this old family mansion. The 
day will be celebrated at the Gilmans' where 
I shall be found should nothing intervene 
to prevent." 

Thomas Cole, an American artist, a 
friend and traveling companion of Mr. 
Coit in Europe, painted a series of alle- 
gorical pictures known as The Voyage 
of Life. The first represents a little 
child attended by an angel guardian, in 
a flower-decked boat just launched upon 
an unknown river. The next, a youth, 
hopeful, self-confident, taking the tide 
at its flood in quest of fame and fortune. 
The third, a man of mature years, tem- 
pest-tossed, almost shipwrecked, strug- 
gling against storm and rapids. 
[175] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

Thus far we have followed our voy- 
ager, and now leave him, cheerful and 
serene in his eighty-ninth year, on a 
calm sea under bright skies, still at- 
tended by his angel guardian who 
points him to a happy harbor and 
heavenly mansions. 

In the beautiful cemetery on the 
banks of the Yantic River at Norwich 
a suitable monument is inscribed with 
these words: 

DANIEL W. COIT, 

born Nov. 29, 1787, 
died July 18, 1876. 

" But what things were gain to rne, 
those I counted loss for Christ, ." 



HARRIET FRANCES, 

his wife, 

born Aug. 15, 1805, 
died Oct. 25, 1878. 

So he giveth his beloved sleep? 

[176] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

Daniel Wadsworth Coit. 

Dates. 

1787. November 29. Born, Norwich, Conn. 

1803. Apprenticed to merchants in New York. 

1808. Began business on his own account. 

1 8 18. September 27. Sailed from New York 

for Peru. 

1 8 19. January 14. Arrived at Lima. 

1820. April. Sailed from Guayaquil for Gib- 

raltar. 
1820. September 27. Arrived at Gibraltar. 
1820-22. Traveled in Spain, France, and 

England. 
1822. June. Sailed from London for South 

America. 
1822. October. Arrived at Buenos Ayres. 

1822. December. Crossed the Andes to Val- 

paraiso. 

1823. December. Arrived at Lima. 

1828. June. Sailed from Lima for New York. 

1829. May. Sailed from New York for England. 
1829-32. Traveled in Europe. 

1832. June. Returned to Norwich. 

1833. October. Visited Grand Rapids. 

1834. September 1. Married Harriet Frances 

Coit. 

[177] 



DANIEL WADSWORTH COIT 

1834-41. Lived in New York and NewRochelle. 
1841-47. Lived in Norwich. 

1848. January. To Mexico for Howland and 

Aspinwall. 

1849. March. From Mexico to San Francisco, 
1849-52. In business in San Francisco. 

1852. June. Returned to his home in Norwich. 
1876. July 18. Died, Norwich. 



[178] 



